by Judith Curry
Here is the content of my presentation to the UN InterAcademy Council Project on Research Integrity and Scientific Responsibility.
The InterAcademy Council and IAP: The Network of Science Academies will undertake projects that address issues of research integrity and scientific responsibility.
I have found no information about this Project online, the IAC website does not have any current activities posted since November 2011 (I urged the committee to make information online at their website). Hence I am not making available here any further information about this effort, and will focus on my own contribution. I note the purview of this group is all of science (not just climate science).
In addition to questions listed on the previous post, I was also asked to respond to the following questions:
What do you believe are the 3 most important core values of research? Do you believe that these values are widely shared among scientists across disciplines and countries?
How are the new tools of communication influencing the conduct of research; how are they impacting integrity? Looking ahead, what changes in the research environment do you anticipate over the next 10 years that will affect research integrity? What will be the most difficult challenges?
What are the 3-4 most important actions that could be taken by researchers, institutions, sponsors, journals, societies, and other stakeholders to foster research integrity and discourage misconduct, particularly in the international context?
The text of my presentation is appended at the end of the post.
My discussion with the Committee
I spent 1 hour with the committee via skype (from a hotel room in New Orleans while attending the Annual Meeting of the American Meteorological Society). I was asked about a dozen questions, I highlight two of them here (paraphrased based on my recollection, with my response (embellished somewhat).
What is your summary message for the Committee?
[see my presentation below for context]. I’ve focused my remarks on the topic of politicized science, or science that is relevant to controversial policies. From the perspective of the individual scientist, the challenges are more to integrity and responsibility, than to actual research misconduct (e.g. fabrication, falsification). And these challenges can be exacerbated or even be caused by institutions (e.g. govt agencies, UN, professional societies), who are interested in protecting reputations, funding, policies, and/or industrial practices. I hope that the committee will tackle this more complex problem, which goes well beyond the traditional concerns with fabrication and falsification.
What is the responsibility of scientists in communicating to the public risks that may be related to their research?
To maintain integrity, scientists absolutely have the responsibility to present their research in context of background knowledge and areas of ignorance and disagreement. With regards to public risks, individual scientists or even particular disciplines, may not have the background knowledge or understanding of societal risks. So I do not see it as an obligation of scientists to communicate public risks associated with their research. However, if a scientist or community of scientist does identify a possible risk, it is responsible behavior for these scientists to engage with health professionals or engineers or whoever is appropriate to clarify and better understand the risk. Alarmism about possible risks is as irresponsible as hiding risks. The key element is to put the science out there in the appropriate context of uncertainty and possible risks, and let other experts and the public assess the risk. Public proclamation by scientists about societal risks, without adequate providing a context for the uncertainty in both the science and the connections of the science to the risks, is not responsible behavior.
—
JC’s presentation
The text from my ppt slides is provided below.
Research Integrity & Scientific Responsibility
A perspective from a climate researcher
Judith Curry
Georgia Institute of Technology
26 January 2012
—
Most important core values of research
Honesty: avoiding fabrication, falsification, plagiarism
Integrity: how we deal with uncertainty and disagreement
Responsibility and accountability: providing objective, impartial, unbiased advice to decision makers
Public trust in science requires honesty, integrity, responsibility
Credibility = trust X expertise
—
Integrity: Richard Feynman Cargo Cult Science
“I’m talking about a specific, extra type of integrity that is not lying, but bending over backwards to show how you are maybe wrong”
“Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be given, if you know them. . . the idea is to try to give all of the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or another.”
Integrity failures:
- deliberately mischaracterizing inconvenient arguments
- inappropriate generalization
- misuse of facts and uncertainties
- hidden value judgments
- selectively omitting inconvenient results
—
Different challenges for different fields
Pure science (e.g. high energy physics)
- Disputes: purely scientific
Applied/regulatory science (e.g. environmental regulation, pharmaceuticals)
- Honesty, integrity, responsibility
- Disputes: industry/economics versus public health/safety
Politicized science (e.g. climate change, health care)
- Integrity and responsibility
- Disputes: values, economics, winners/losers, complexity, etc.
—
Institutional problems: Protecting reputations, funding, policies & industry practices
universities
- insufficient oversight of individual honesty; insufficient concern and education about integrity and responsibility
professional societies
- position statements on controversial, policy relevant topics
- journals with biased editorial practices
national academies
- concerns about bias, impartiality, objectivity
national governments and funding agencies
- targeting research areas and picking “winners” to support government policies
international institutions (e.g. UN assessments; IPCC)
- impact of politics on narrow framing of complex scientific issues for scientific assessments
- stacking of advisory boards to support an agenda
- lack of conflict of interest oversight
- insufficient independent oversight
- insufficient uncertainty assessment and management
- insufficient transparency and traceability of conclusions
- fundamental conflict between integrity and consensus building
—
Impact of new tools of communication: Open Knowledge
Enables:
- Open access to published journal articles
- Online access to data (all levels, including metadata)
- Online access to model code and documentation
- Development of extended peer communities (public auditing) around issues of regulatory or political relevance
- Scientists engaging with the public via social media.
- More diverse sources of information available to the public
Opportunities for scientists:
- public engagement
- public education
- open knowledge
- networking
Challenges to responsible conduct of scientists:
- authoritatively writing on topics outside personal areas of expertise
- conflict of values in discussing politicized science
- concerns about policy advocacy by scientists
- dealing with “noise” and disagreement
—
Solutions for Politicized Science: Accountability (I) Best practices from regulatory science & engineering
Data quality management and assessment
- accuracy & precision; data cleansing, integrity validation
- information quality, data quality assessment
Independent model verification and validation
- complete documentation, publicly available
Uncertainty assessment and management
- identify areas and types of uncertainty, ambiguity, ignorance
- sensitivity assessment, uncertainty propagation, expert elicitation
- test for reasoning flaws
—
Solutions for Politicized Science: Accountability (II) Open access to scientific data, models & publications
All scientific materials upon which regulations & policies are based should be publicly available and easily accessible (online)
- Open (internet) access to published journal articles
- Online access to data (all levels, including metadata)
- Online access to model code and documentation
—
Solutions for Politicized Science: Integrity (III) No explicit consensus building in assessments
Scientific consensus building is not part of the scientific method; it is most often invoked in popular or political debates.
Perils of an explicit consensus building process:
- Explicit consensus building processes can enforce overconfidence and belief polarization.
- Consensus beliefs tend to serve as agents in their own confirmation
- Dismissal of skepticism is detrimental to scientific progress
- Disagreement is marginalized and hidden
- Overreliance on expert judgment motivates shortcuts in reasoning and hidden biases
Should all raw data being made available be a pre-condition of publication?
YES. As part of the publication agreement, authors should sign a statement that they will make their data available upon request, during the review process and for a specified period post publication.
Impossible to enforce something like this with all journals; making data publicly available is more logically enforced by the funding agencies.
Climate science based on historical data, which should be freely available. The key issue is how to overcome the problems of historical data sets; the data manipulation and metadata are of essential importance.
Is it responsible and ethical to hide research articles, based on publicly funded data, behind paywalls, as in the case of journals like Nature and Science, which are often financially prohibitive even to universities, let alone those in developing countries?
Scientific journals need to be economically viable to exist.
National and international assessments on policy relevant science should only use journal articles that are available in the public domain. Such a requirement would influence journal policies towards making articles publicly available after a certain time period (< 6 months).
What are the research ethics and scientific responsibilities of the open science movement, versus what is done behind paywalls?
Let freedom reign on the internet. Authors of published journal articles should have the right to post their published articles (at least in manuscript form) on the internet.
How can we address the challenge “aggregating” uncertainty across many researchers and many disciplines: each narrow subspeciality may have different techniques and customs.
Characterizing uncertainty and reasoning about uncertainty is one of the biggest challenges in science. Inadequate attention has been paid to this issue.
Most important is that all factors that contribute to the uncertainties are reported openly, allowing others to judge the level of uncertainties and the impact on the conclusions.
What is the responsible use of grey literature (including blog posts) by scientists, particularly in scientific assessments?
If grey literature is perceived to be a very important element in a scientific assessment, we should be asking whether this topic is appropriate for scientific assessment. In the case of the IPCC WG II Report, the answer to this question might very well be no.
Public policy is influenced by a broad range of information, including grey literature and blog posts. There is unquestionably some valuable information in the grey literature.
The use of grey material should always be qualified and shortcomings of the material adequately acknowledged.
What is responsible behavior of scientists in balancing the challenges of rights of free speech and political activism?
Scientists have the same right as everyone else to try to influence policy. It is ultimately the task of the decision makers to decide how to weight each piece of information, and who it comes from.
Getting involved in advocacy is the choice of an individual scientist. The choice to become an advocate brings risks to the scientist’s credibility and raises concerns about scientific bias. Any reason to doubt the individual’s honesty can be very detrimental to the scientist’s credibility.
Advocacy by scientific institutions (e.g. professional societies; IPCC) is a much bigger problem, and can be very confusing to decision makers.
JC comments
Kudos to the IAC for taking on these issues.
I would like to thank those of you who provided thoughtful responses on the Part I thread, I read these carefully and used some of the sentiments that were expressed on the blog.
I look forward to a continuing dialogue on this topic, particularly as more information about the IAC project becomes available.
p.s. The reason I was invited to engage with the IAC Project is that one of the Committee members is a regular reader of this blog (!)
I agree wholeheartedly.
Excellent presentation, excellent responses to the questions. Kudos for you, Judy.
Very good presentation.
I am not sure how you would suggest dealing with relevant privately (or corporate) funded research. Would the proposal effectively eliminate it from consideration since those funding would generally not want to fully release the data?
I do especially like this section.
(III) No explicit consensus building in assessments
Consensus is the enemy of science.
Dr Curry –
Something you touched on in your introduction strikes me as rarely mentioned by most climate scientists – the place for scientific agnosticism. I mean the agnosticism of TH Huxley – the admission that on a particular subject [in the debate of his day, the existence of God] that science has nothing to say.
You write –
I think you could have put this much more strongly. But it is perhaps not from within science that the boundaries and demarcation have to be defined. It seems to me that without some appropriate restraints, people like Hansen And Mann feel they are qualified to instruct people [including those who have yet to be born] about what is important to them, how they characterise risk in their lives, and so on. They also feel qualified to pontificate about how agriculture, cities and infrastructure will be placed in regard to a changing climate. Really?
I’ll repeat the refreshing perspective of Professor Richard Betts discussed last week saying that one of the reasons he doesn’t think of 2 degrees of warming as dangerous (as a scientist) is because it is not a question he can answer as a scientist As a citizen he can express he opinion like everybody else but dangerous is a value judgement, and not something that GCM’s can be programmed for.
i agree with you Dr Curry about the value of summarising what science can (and can’t) say and communicating it to the relevant people ie everybody. When Hansen writes in the abstract to his papers that unless certain political paths are followed there will be ineffable disasters it is obvious he is not writing as a scientist (because science has nothing to say on the subject) but as an ill-informed, frightened individual.
If science can’t find the edge of its subject matter from within, I guess it’s up to interested non-scientists to draw the line from the outside.
Interesting post, Anteros.
But I am compelled to respond to this:
”
I mean the agnosticism of TH Huxley – the admission that on a particular subject [in the debate of his day, the existence of God] that science has nothing to say.
”
This sort of claim depends entirely on what is meant by “God”. Given, for example, claims such as “God makes miracles” or “God created humans” or “God created the Earth in 6 says”, science most definitely has something to say.
Similarly, climate science does, in fact, have something to say about the future of the climate and the probability of disastrous events.
Your “drawing the line” around the subject matter of science is just an attempt “define away” scientific projections as non-science.
Of course GCMs cannot be programmed to make value judgements.
But 2 degrees of global temperature increases will have consequences that are not quite so completely mysterious and ineffable as the question of a deity’s existence.
CNP, I give you 1/3. I do think science has something to say on how long it took God to create the earth.
billc
Hey. Thanks for the 1/3.
Your thoughts on the matter of Earth’s history will be taken under advisement. :-)
ceteris –
I think you slightly missed my point. Particularly with Huxley, he coined the very word agnosticism solely to make the critical point that the existence of God was a matter for faith – not science. He wanted to be clear about the kinds of things to which science was applicable, and also those to which it was not.
You misrepresent me when you imply that I say science can’t speak to the probability of disastrous events. What it cannot do is decide for anyone whether they wish to perceive something as disastrous, mildly problematic or a great adventure. It has nothing to say on the matter.
I specifically made reference to Richard Betts comments about 2 degrees of warming. Climate science may, allegedly, have a rough and ready, vague, guess as to when, or if, 2 degrees of warming may occur. It can say precious little about the danger inherent in such a rise because that is a subjective value judgement.
The IPCC First assessment report predicted that sea levels would rise by 6cm per decade. All well and good (though typically an overestimate). If it said this will lead to certain catastrophe I assume you’d have wanted to ask “On what authority do you declare this future to be catastrophic, and for whom?”
Anteros;
Clarifications appreciated.
”
Climate science may, allegedly, have a rough and ready, vague, guess as to when, or if, 2 degrees of warming may occur. It can say precious little about the danger inherent in such a rise because that is a subjective value judgement.
”
May? Allegedly? Guess?
Respectfully, it is only a matter of time.
I grant that the exact year and day cannot be predicted.
The danger involved is not a ‘subjective value judgement’ of the kind involving matters of personal taste or a complete absence of relevant information.
You may find this interesting:
http://scienceblogs.com/islandofdoubt/2009/03/are_we_safe_with_2_degrees_of.php
Ceteris –
I’ll look at the link, but I’m armed with my Betts quote!
My point about the predictions of two degrees was some gratuitous sarcasm to make the point that even in the area where it has sole authority, climate science can only muster a very big dollop of uncertainty.
“Only a matter of time”? Possibly. But a number of reasonable people think there won’t be a further 2 degrees this century..
I’ll disagree because I think there are some aspects how we respond to predictions that include a subjective value judgement. Also, when climate scientists talk about sea level rise, what expertise do they have about the possible consequences? Any?
I personally think expertise on the subject of the future is notable for its absence particularly because reasoning is usually replaced with worry-driven imagination. Remember the expertise of Paul Ehrlich?
ceteris –
Well you’ve got Stefan Rahmstorf making my point for me by being delusional about what his profession enables him to be authoritative about. I’d be very interested to hear Judith’s take on this – or Richard Betts’ or either of the Pielkes, or Richard Tol…. –
This is the arrogant tryanny of science that Feyerabend talked about. It is the patronising priesthood and completely unjustified. Who the hell does he think he is?
The insidious part is claiming that he knows something about the future as a climate scientist. In a primitive and immature science beset with ignorance and uncertainty, the job definitely doesn’t come with a crystal ball (just sometimes an excess of hubris).
ceteris –
One extra example from you link.
The blogger [someone you know?] says something with which I profoundly disagree –
I think that completely misrepresent the situation – although it’s the kind of thing the Rahmstorfs of the world fantasise about. But it would actually be worse if it were true.
Climate science will never be in a position to tell people what civilisation can handle because it knows nothing of agriculture, cities, building, transport, politics, communities, psychology, sociology etc etc etc.
It can make some tentative predictions about sea levels but it knows precious little even about that!!
Anteros,
You object to Rahmsdorf’s totally uncontroversial comment because he dares to make a pronouncement that we should be concerned about 2C warming. Yet you frequently make confident pronouncements about how we should not be worried about such warming. I guess the reason he doesn’t have a crystal ball is because you swiped it.
”
But a number of reasonable people think there won’t be a further 2 degrees this century.
”
A non-zero number of reasonable people believed that faster-than-sound travel was impossible.
If you don’t mind, I’ll base my beliefs on the best current evidence – not the incredulity of self-appointed ‘reasonable people’.
”
The insidious part is claiming that he knows something about the future as a climate scientist.
”
But, Rahmstorf does, in fact, know something about the future as a climate scientist.
Science involves successful prediction of the future.
So far, scientists have been surprisingly accurate at prediction.
Clearly, you don’t like what Hansen and Rahmstorf are saying – fine – but to tar them with terms like ‘insidious’ is wrong, IMO.
aa –
Please – at least read my comment!
My point – rather clearly I thought – was that his statement was insidious because he claimed authority on the matter as a climate scientist. I don’t think he has that, and claiming it is pernicious.
The fact that I think he is completely wrong is an additional factor, but separate.
Do you see the difference?
Anteros,
Fair enough, I slightly missed the point you were making, but I still don’t see the objection. He is expressing a view about future changes in climate and their likely impact. If he was commenting as a lawyer or a dustman or as some guy on a blog with unknown credentials and claiming to thereby have some authority on the subject I might be rather skeptical. I don’t find it particularly outrageous that someone would claim that being a climate scientist might enabled them to express an informed view on the subject. And I might wonder what authority you have on the subject which enables you to pronounce him completely wrong.
“While really bad things may happen at 2 degrees, they may very well not happen either – especially in the short term (there may be a committment to longer-term consequences such as ongoing sea level rise that future generations have to deal with, but imminent catastrophe affecting the current generation is far less certain than people make out. We just don’t know.” … – Richard Betts
So with one outcome, you have a hole in the head (a really bad thing), and with the other 5 you have a happy life – if you are in the current generation, whatever the freak that means.
andrew adams –
I dislike the appeal to authority – especially when the person is claiming that they themselves are the authority.
If Richard Lindzen said it was because he was a climate scientist that he should be treated as having a special authority, I would find it equally pernicious – particularly if he then used that supposed authority to preach about things unconnected with climate science.
To me, that’s what Hansen and Rahmstorf do, hence my call for a demarcation.
Rahmstorf also tries to give the impression that he speaks for other climate scientists, which is tantamount to speaking for science as a whole. One step further and he will be in Michael Mann’s position, who can say
Presumably directly to Mann himself and he’s inscribing the tablets as we speak..
ceteris non paribus
I would state that the record shows, in general, that experts in any field have marginal results on predictions made in that field, which go beyond a few years.
For fields such as economics or climate science, where the relationships are extremely complex and chaotic and the degree of uncertainty is great, the hit rate on predictions by experts is usually not much better than that of non-experts, as Nassim Taleb points out in his The Black Swan. This is even more so if the prediction covers a long time span, as do the IPCC projections of year 2100 (or even year 2200).
One just has to imagine a learned prognosticator from around Napoleon’s time making predictions about how our life (or climate) might be today.
Hansen’s 1988 prediction of GHG induced warming was a total flop.
IPCC’s prediction that the first decade of the new century would see AGW-caused warming of 0.2 degC is another example of “scientists” making a lousy prediction.
So I’d question the accuracy of your statement, at least as it would apply to climate science.
Max
“ineffable”
1. Defying expression or description
2. Too sacred to be uttered
Heh. You might mean 1, in which case science must be silent. Hansen, too! If 2, we all must be silent.
But prob’ly you wanted “inevitable“.
Brian H
The self-reference you observe is relevant…
Especially as it was Hansen’s insistence on using ineffable :)
You’re joking! Hansen insisted (!?) on using “ineffable”? The man is mis-educated or a serious loon. “Insisted” suggests both of the above.
Outstanding. Dont we wish all scientists could adhere to and articulate these values and ideals.
Dennis, generics and plaitudes can be applied to any party. Good for the Ten Commandments but not so balanced for the past 40 years of Green Agenda setting around carbon and increasing government authority. Not so good for the past 25 years of AGW ambition or the parties involved.
Weak kneed framing of the “debate” like this is obfuscation. The very people who hear this would be inclined to take it as a call to register skeptics and send them to re-education camps. Others will have a false fit about what an outlier Dr. Curry is that they might be talking about “them” even when she went to the trouble to not name them specifically.
“Getting involved in advocacy is the choice of an individual scientist. The choice to become an advocate brings risks to the scientist’s credibility and raises concerns about scientific bias. Any reason to doubt the individual’s honesty can be very detrimental to the scientist’s credibility.”
It would/should be even more “detrimental” when we stop making false equivalence about general advocacy and admit the AGW science is infected with a very specific kind of advocacy. This is very much back to the “they’re are no communists in Hollywood and you don’t have a right to ask” talking points from an earlier thread. Sorry, the public has every right to know the eco-/green/radical/statist culture that are foundations of the “consensus” and the expert academic culture it is supported by that has many of the same cross currents. This isn’t some minority issue in the AGW consensus, it’s the core and nucleus of the AGW consensus structure itself.
In part, generics and platitudes are a whitewash. I can see good intentions too and you deserve credit for that but why not call the weasels out directly and accept the blow-back for a worthwhile cause like the truth of the situation? Too much for the PC audience to handle? Better they hear it from you then.
All that for simply giving our host a very well deserved compliment for being her usual circumspect, objective self? I am a skeptic. I can only imagine how many paragraphs you would have written if I was otherwise. Try not to ramble so much next time
dennis;
I take it that cwon is questioning the nature and source of that “circumspection”.
If it is for the purpose of leaving bridges unburnt, it’s a strategic choice. It does leave her with more than a foot in the door to observe and comment and influence discussion and events. One might doubt the efficacy of that approach, but it’s maybe workable. She does get lots of invites and chances to speak no other prominent un-Believer does.
If it is purely fear of professional ostracism, it’s less praiseworthy or valuable. You seem to be implying this possibility.
If it’s an attempt to right the ship of “climate science” from within by calling it to do better science, it’s probably whistling in the winds of a financial hurricane.
The least attractive ‘scenario’, which some have asserted, is that it’s a false flag operation attempting to keep the sceptics and political resisters of the planned Green Autocracy mollified and distracted while the wheels grind on. Not unthinkable, notwithstanding her explicit references to advocacy and corruption in the posting and submission.
So “calling out the weasels and accepting the blow-back” is perhaps her last resort, or not a position she agrees with. But it may come to that kind of battlefield choice at some point. AGW is, as you note, a “very special kind of advocacy.”
Correction: as cwon14 notes. This “broken nesting” reply system is confusin’.
Dennis, the presentation leads no where but a file cabinet. Do you think if all this was acted upon 20 years ago the world would have different today? That’s beyond N-A-I-V-E.
The TEAM would have responded to?;
“Honesty, integrity, responsibility”
Think Neville Chamberlain drafting pleading letters to Hitler 3 days after England was defaulting on it’s treaties to France when the war had ALREADY STARTED. This sort of academic banter isn’t just useless it’s harmful as well as decades late. It ignores who the parties are and what they are about. It alludes to what has gone on rather than report what has gone on.
1/10th as effective and not by accident.
The responsible thing to do is condemn the IPCC and the consensus as corrupt and identify them as political fringe groups (by name) which they are. Denounce the product that was produced and call for a termination of the entire AGW science structure as politically engineered.
Dr. Curry in soft soap is listing a whole host of ethical violations in abstract rather than specifically listing events and condemning them. If you think about it a minute, you should realize it doesn’t merit praise at all.
I am sure there is a point in there somewhere but I am having a hard time understanding you. Unfortunately, I am not multi-lingual: I only speak English
Disingenuous and puerile, dennis. The point is that being reasonable and counting on the AGW camp to act on appeals to principle is pandering and dangerous.
You believe cwon14 is being reasonable?
Louise –
Maybe cwon is being reasonable…….for cwon
Typical of troll qualities here, when they hear something they don’t like they pretend the point isn’t understandable or they vanish.
As for the would-be skeptics, like Dr. Curry they are stuck on talking points from 15 years ago. I’m sure the audience for which this is intended is living 20 years in the past and will shocked or even offended.
This is all way behind the curve.
By the way, thank you Dennis.
Warming trolls are one thing, it’s only over recent times that I realized what a cult of personality is going on here with many who claim to be skeptical. As if Dr. Curry only should be praised for moderating 20 years too late to the AGW debate. This thread is a perfect example of how both the moderator and weak skeptics converge to form time wasting and enabling postures they imagine are “on the edge”.
It shows you how think the lock-step consensus dominates even while being questioned. They get to frame how they will be addressed. The tone of Dr. Curry’s presentation is pandering and weak, skeptics here say very little. House servants in the church of global warming complaining about they aren’t respected for their timid dissent. They need spine implants.
Nice generics as always but;
“What is responsible behavior of scientists in balancing the challenges of rights of free speech and political activism?”
It would be progress if you just came out and named what political cultures are associated to whom? Joe Romm would take these platitudes to rationalize the arrest Dr. Lindzen and rip his throat out. Most are going to assume we are thinking of all the same people and groups instead but why can’t Dr. Curry just name them and identify specifically? (Hansen, Mann, Jones, Greenpeace, IPCC, UN, Gore, Democrats/Socialists, WWF, Most enviornmental groups with similar connections)
*************
“Politicized science (e.g. climate change, health care)
Integrity and responsibility
Disputes: values, economics, winners/losers, complexity, etc. ”
Should add study of radical eco/green-zealot culture that often can’t produce its notes (evidence) or replicate results (Mann). Outright cooking of books and records should be added as well. Probably ties into academic and research reform where large concentrations of similar political peers (eco-left) incubate concepts like AGW for a common need.
Good cover but soon to be forgotten. Naming the names, groups and politics would be remembered and 100% more effective in making progress.
cwon14:
Could you maybe try writing a few of your posts with some sort of point in mind?
The aimlessness of your categorical sentence-fragments and miscellaneous stereotypes is quite fascinating in a strange sort of way, but since you mentioned making progress, maybe you could lead by example.
Progress is the end and rebuttal of AGW advocacy at even the fringe academic level.
Now you can go back to sleep at your Eugenics class if you like.
ceteris,
You’re hardly the first bumptious pest the greenshirt’s have thrown at this blog. But in the past, your hive-masters have always sent us trolls with intellectual pretensions (inevitably obscured by their creep-out obsessions, to be sure). But in you, ceteris?–I mean what do we get? A tedious, leg-humping nag stripped bare of any virtue save annoyance. Give us a break, will yah?
So, ceteris could you please–pretty please–start providing some quality trollery? I mean, like, that little troll-bomb riff of yours about the joys of eugenics that you set-off in this blog’s previous post was not half bad–but it’s the sort of thing you should be comin’ up with all the time. Otherwise, you’re just nothing but a one-hit, flash-in-the-pan, troll wannabe! I mean, at best! You don’t want that do you, ceteris? You know what mean, ceteris? Again, you need to come up with good stuff all the time. Get it? Or be a considerate troll and just spare us your chatterbox tedium until you do! Fair enough?
Hey! ceteris! I’ll help you out a little–why don’t you share with us your trollish thoughts on eugenics’ wonderful potential in relationship to the conservative, old, white, men who just don’t “get it” problem, currently afflicting the CAGW scam? O. K. ? Sound good? Now that would be worth a read.
I realize ceteris, that your whole life has been one warm-bath of unearned and undeserved effusive praise, but someone’s got to finally be honest with you: Sitting down? Got a hankie? Ready for the shock of your untested, untried, spoiled-brat life?–the trite, good-young-pioneer, five-year-plan-approved nag-boogers you’ve absently flicked at us so far are a disgrace to trolls everywhere!
dude –
“Leg-humping” was my insult. I’m pretty sure I can document that my usage was the first in the history of Climate Etc.
I wouldn’t necessarily object to you stealing it, but it is so perfectly suited to describing how Don chases me around Climate Etc. that I think that using it in any other context just diminishes the proper use of the term.
Please cease and desist. To do anything else would be poor form.
joshy, and I was giving you a break. Letting you run wild and free to dispense your foolishness unfettered by reasoned scorn. Have you found that mediator, yet? Or are you chickening out? You are an insecure little attention hound. And nobody believes that you found a “girlfriend”. You still haven’t decided, based on the scientific evidence, what your sexual preference is. You said it a couple of weeks ago, as if anybody cared. Go back and read your posts. You will learn a lot about yourself. It will be hurtful, but you might be able to see the error of your ways. It’s lonely being josh. Mosher and I still have hope for you. Judith just doesn’t care.
PWAHO –
http://tinyurl.com/89gatxc
Josh,
An interesting “leg-humping” comment, Josh! Perfect in every “leg-humping” way. And a matter of serious intellectual moment since only the term “denier” has more of a sting than “leg-humper” among climate science’s terms-of-art.
My first use of the term–and I had not previously seen it used on any blog–was in my Comment #10, dtd October 2, 2011 on Deltoid’s October 2011 “Open Thread” post. And it was with my Comment # 18, to the same post on the same date, that I first called somone, one my favorite Deltoids, actually, a “leg-humper” To be precise, I called him “Deltoid’s alpha leg-humper”. Incidentally, Josh, Deltoid’s October 2011 “Open Thread” is still available in its blog’s archives for your perusal–and some good stuff there, in those two comments of mine, especially no. 10, if I do say so myself.
So I claim October 2, 2011 for my “first-use” claim of “leg-humper” and its historic introduction into the climate science lexicon to the delight of all thinking persons engaged in climate science’s many controversies. So, Josh, ol’ pal, can you beat October 2, 2011 for “first-use” of “leg-humper?” Or did you lead with your “dude” chin, “dude”?
Let’s see what you’ve got!
Sorry josh, that looks photoshopped and it definitely does not prove that you have found a “girlfriend”. We can’t tell your companion’s sex from just looking at your obviously doctored photo. You slipped up there, putz. But those are nice shoes you got on.
Mike –
Well – it is an interesting question, and right in line with the questions about proper ethics.
Now I certainly can’t claim to a usage prior to October (nice research, dude. Do you keep a freakin’ database of your insults?). However, I am quite sure that I used the term at Climate Etc. prior to you using the term here. Quite soon after Don began chasing me around at Climate Etc., I coined the term here because it just jumped out and screamed every time he posted a comment (come on, admit it, in your moments of non-partisanship you have to agree that it fits him perfectly).
So which is the most ethical way to resolve this debate? I’m not sure that I have a definitive answer, but I Judith would be the best arbiter, and I doubt that she’ll weigh in (let alone not properly delete this exchange) – so how do we decide in the most ethical manner? A virtual coin flip of some sort?
joshy, please show us some of those photos of your little companions again. It’s your mom in some of them, right? I am impressed with the shoes, however. I had you figured for Birkenstocks, or flip-flops.
Actually, mike –
I might have it on you either way. Here’s a reference from early November –
http://judithcurry.com/2011/11/10/disinformation-vs-fraud-in-the-climate-debate/#comment-136767
Where I’m using a term that is a very close relative – and clearly indicating that I had used the term with Don earlier (although I’m not finding that earlier usage).
Anyway, as a connoisseur of the fine insult, I think you should agree that the most well-suited usage should take precedence. That would demand that it be left for me to use with Don – hands down.
Which comment are you showing us, joshy. You got like a hundred of them on that thread, as usual. Why don’t show us some of the ones that linked to pictures of your mom humping your leg.
Josh,
There’s only one ethical way to resolve the matter:
Acknowledge “leg-humper” as my rightful intellectual property, based on the priority of my claim.
Fess up that you either filched the term “leg-humper” from Deltoid, where the first-use was mine, or got it on the sly from one of your Deltoid hive-mate “dudes,” who filched it–not informing you, alas, as to it’s originator, to your current chagrin, we can be sure.
And, finally, you need to look at yourself in the mirror, Josh. And, without avoiding eye-contact, say to yourself “How could I be so stupid? Now I look the complete ass! A laughing stock! And a doom-butt booger-brain! I should have checked things out better! And, mike, isn’t goin’ to let me bluff my way out of this, either–I just know it!” Then ball up one of your hands into a fist and strike yourself repeatedly on the forehead while intoning “STOOPID! STOOPID! STOOPID! STOOPID! STOOPID! I MEAN LIKE I’M REALLY, REALLY STOOOOOOOPID!”
You screwed up, Josh. Don’t try to brazen it out. It only makes things worse, you know. I got yah! Yeah buddy!
And while you’re at it Josh, would you mind disengaging your fore-legs from my lower extremities? Thank you.
mike,
The little putz will challenge you to a $10,000 bet and then chicken out.
Where did little josh go? Got too rough for the little crybaby. I remind him too much of the bully who took his little plastic sheriff’s badge, and stuck the little putz’s head in the toilet, back in kindygarten.
mike –
That’s just ridiculous. I believe you know that charge is completely unfounded and I’m deeply, deeply offended that you’d make such a baseless charge. I’m not sure that I’ve visited Deltoid more than once or twice ever, and I certainly never came across your use of the term there.
Are you honestly saying that you never saw my usage of the term here? Or even that the term immediately came to mind once you saw Don chasing me around Climate Etc.”
Regardless the question of first usage, I’m shocked that as a connoisseur of the insult, you’re still holding on to your claim of ownership anyway – despite the perfect fit for Don.
OK – my heart can’t take this anymore. Hopefully, once you’ve thought this through a bit, your sense of moral integrity will lead you to acknowledge your mistake here – but I’m not sure I can handle this rancor and insult to the art of the insult any longer.
I’m off to watch the rest of the debate. They’re always a laugh a second (especially when Paul is speaking), and I need some cheering up after this exchange.
Actually, now that I think about it, Santorum is hilarious also.
Actually, so is Gingrich.
And of course, so is Romney.
.
Don,
Thanks for cheering me on!
I’ll leave Josh a few moments to answer my last comment and then I’m moving in for the delicious “kill.” I mean, I’ve got Josh good and despite his ham-handed attempts at squirming his way out of the “little predicament” he currently finds himself in, he’s not getting away with this one.
This is so good, Don! Savor it with me, please. Josh starts it. Then blunders into a man-trap of his own making. And, then, as he hangs suspended in a net, he tries to brazen his way out! In front of everybody! I mean, it doesn’t get any better than this. Monty Python materiel!
Show us some more of your little doggie pictures, joshy. Your mom has big eyes, and big ears too. You sorry little putz. You can’t even defend your mom. I withdraw everything I said about her, and apologize. I pity the poor woman with such a coward as a son.
mike,
The little coward is trying to change the subject to politics. What a punk.
C’mon Josh,
Just for record purposes your Jan 26, 8:55 p. m. comment led with chutzpah of unprecedented boldness on this or any climate blog, “I might have you either way”. And then–AND THEN–you referenced a November comment in support of your “first-use” claim for “leg-humper” (a comment in which, oh by the way, you didn’t use the term and even acknowledged you didn’t ). Remember, Josh, NOVEMBER COMES AFTER–REPEAT, AFTER!–OCTOBER AND A WHOLE LOT AFTER THE 2ND OF OCTOBER. So–see a little problem here, Josh? Huh?
And, what else? Oh yes, you’re quite sure you used the term, “leg-humper” even earlier too, but–oh darn!–you can’t quite find where you did so, right at the moment. O. K. Josh. Do I really have to add anything more to that last? I think not.
And in your last comment you asked me if I hadn’t seen your usage of “leg-humper” on this blog previously. Well, as a matter of fact, Josh, I have seen your prior use of the term on this blog (and that picture of a little leg-humper too). And observing your use the term, I assumed at the time you knew a good thing when you spotted it at Deltoid and “liberated” the zinger from me. And, if it wouldn’t be a whole heap of too much trouble, could you, Josh, pretty please, instruct me as to what that has to do with my superior claim to “first-use” of “leg-humper” in any possible way?
A last point:
I didn’t call you on your use of “leg humper” earlier, Josh, because I’m a generous, altruistic guy–you know, a scrappy, “ordinary Joe”, doing my good-citizenship best on my own dime without the benefit of some Big-Green, money-bag, carbon-hoggie hypocrite “biggie” juicing me with dough by the trough-load–to make the world a better place. And so, “leg-humper”, along with “doom-butt”, “thermorrhoid” (need to dust that one off and use it more often), and various compound terms employing combing forms of “zits”, “boogers”, “lefty, herbivore, stink-bomb flatulence”, and “vegan todt fahrts!” are my disinterested gift to that most serious of issues currently facing mankind–the CAGW scam and the whole freakin’ zoo it attracts. I mean, I do it for the kids, Josh. And that’s good enough for me.
Led with your chin, ol’ buddy–dEEEEEElicious!
He’s gone mike. That’s what cowards do.
mike –
Wow. Put down the keyboard, bro.
I mean I really do think that I have the proper claim (you know I never saw your usage of the term at Cimate Etc. and you have now admitted to seeing my usage here at Climate Etc. here prior to your usage here) – but I was only trying to have a little fun.
I had no idea you would go off the handle like that. Obviously, it really means a great deal to you – and given how far you’ve gone into la la land here – so I’ll happily rescind my claim (even though it’s clearly a valid one), and allow you to believe your claim holds sway. It doesn’t really matter that much to me.
Seriously. If it’ll help you to calm down, claim the term as yours. I don’t like seeing you like this, and I’ll do whatever I can to help you to feel more normal.* Certainly on an issue of so little real importance. It was just a little joke, my man.
*using that term in a relative fashion, of course.
> So I claim October 2, 2011 for my “first-use” claim of “leg-humper” and its historic introduction into the climate science lexicon to the delight of all thinking persons engaged in climate science’s many controversies.
Vintage 2008:
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=508_1204652173
joshy, badger him to bet you $1)k and then back out, you little coward. And you keep begging Judith to pay you some attention. Why should she take a little cowardly blowhard like you seriously. Good night joshy.
Williard (Mitt?) – what on earth are you doing? It is illogical to get in the middle of a dogfight.
Josh,
Really, Josh! Do yourself a favor, stop squirmin’, guy. . You’ve been pinned down, Josh, and I know you hate it. But when you screw-up, the best course of action is to man-up, graciously acknowledge your error, accept “responsibility”, take your medicine and then move on.
And I’m just havin’ fun too, Josh. All at your expense of course. And the best part of it is your fantastic, utterly improbable twists and turns to avoid the inevitable admission–“Yes, I blew it!” Best show in town!
Willard,
Wow! Let me acknowledge that you’ve found a use of “leg-humping” that clearly preceeds mine. I note, for what it’s worth, my complete ignorance of this prior usage, before now. But that’s neither here nor there. My claim to first-use of “leg-humper” is now untenable and I quit my claim. I thank you, Willard, for your dligent research, I acknowledge my error, and extend my apologies to the anonymous headline writer who was first to introduce “leg-humper” into the lexicon of climate science. He/she is the master, not me.
See how it’s done, Josh.
mike –
You’re still going on about this?
Look – I have already agreed to let you think that you have the valid claim here.
Even though you know that I was the first to use the reference here at Climate Etc. (and you admitted to seeing my use of it prior to your use of it here at Climate Etc.)
Even though you have falsely claimed that I stole your reference from reading Deltoid.
And even though, as it turns out, you falsely claimed “first use” in the climate blogosphere and the “historic introduction” into the climate lexicon to the vastly overstated “delight of all thinking persons” engage in climate science debates (I mean seriously, what kind of delusion could lead you to think that any actually thinking person could care less about the use of references to leg-humping?)
It’s all fine, mike. Really, if I had know that this was going to be so meaningful to you, I would never have even brought it up.
Just listen to your bff, don, with his sycophantic attempts to win your favor, and calm down.
It’s all good. I have agreed to let you think that your claim is more valid. Don’t let the issue worry you any further.
You have the valid claim, mike.
Yeah. That’s the ticket. You have the valid claim.
This has to be one of the most hilarious things I’ve seen people talk about on a blog, in awhile.
You guys are awesome, and put on one heck of a show, and I do mean that sincerely. One thing can be said about Climate Etc. above most blogs: it’s got character!
The future of scientific publishing is a tantalizing subject for speculation. I expect that sooner or later it portends the end of print journals – completely or near completely – and that trend will be unstoppable for better or worse.
I’m pretty sure it’s mostly for better. The costs of publishing online should be much less than those for print journals, making it easier to subscribe cheaply (including institutional subscriptions), and easier to advance the date after publication by which the contents will be available to the public free of charge.
There is a downside, however, or at least a challenge. Expensive subscriptions require subscribers to make judgments about the quality of what they read, and thereby discourage the publication of what they consider inferior print journals because the costs can’t be recouped. Currently, some of this is seen in the existence of online-only communications that are perceived to be unreliable because they are either inadequately peer-reviewed (if claiming to be journals), or not reviewed at all (e.g., blogs).
Internet viewers can of course visit all of the sources if they wish, and undoubtedly will find good material in some of the online-only communications, but they also know that there exists an implicit prioritization of perceived quality, in which print journals and their online versions enjoy higher status than online-only journals, and much higher status than non-reviewed form of online communication.
The eventual disappearance of these distinctions would not be a problem except for two concerns – first, there are only 24 hours in a day, and second, no-one is expert enough to quickly evaluate the relative merits of a large multitude of published material without depending on some outside guidance. Because none of us can read more than a tiny fraction of what is published, how are we to decide what not to read?
Obviously, the answer is not to prevent journals from springing up right and left, even if we could, but to find some guidance mechanism for individual readers to know how content is rated. The task may fall to some extent to quasi-official sources (e.g., various scientific societies), or perhaps to as yet unidentified mechanisms, but I think it must inevitably be protected from partisan advocacy, and that is not an easy thing to ensure. I also think it would be unwise to make it a simple matter of popular voting, which would be subject to enormous partisan pressure. It requires some degree of expert judgment.
If this can be accomplished, a new era of Internet communication will represent a huge step forward. Until then, we will still have to confront difficult choices without adequate information. It goes without saying that under any circumstance, the choice of what to read will ultimately reside in the reader. Nobody will be forbidden to read what some guidance sources judge to be trash, but we will be aware whether or not we are doing that.
What to read and what to not read is really a problem. As you say, there are not enough years in a day to read a small percent of what is out there.
You say: It requires some degree of expert judgment.
A problem here is that sometimes we take part in these online exchanges because we disagree with the current consensus expert judgment. Even if an expert judgment is wrong, not all of the opinions against it will be right. An expert judgment could be wrong and all or the opinions against it could be wrong. We should all try to be skeptics of expert judgment and of our own judgment and of all others. We don’t change when we believe, we only change when we are skeptical.
We need a Rottentomatoes of science publication.
Fred – I agree with you.
But I’d like to be able to look at Metacritic too ;)
CiteSeer would seem to be a reasonable first step.
I think I would want to give priority for credibility – in my mind at least – to those online publications that provided complete original data and documented fully all methodology – and invited comment from anyone who cared to reproduce and critque the results therein.
Josh
Just saw this in passing and assume this thread is dead as the serious crowd seem to have departed so assume its ok now to weigh in. I suspect the phrase ‘leg humper’ long predated both you and mike. Its a term I am certainly familiar with from way back (but would never use of course) theres even a beer using the phrase
http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/12516/27857
tonyb
tony –
Thanks. I never contended to be the first one to use the term, even in the climate debate (as mike, ridiculously claimed). I only said that I was pretty sure that I was the first one to use it here at Climate Etc. Now mike admitted that he thought that was true, and even that he went on to follow in my pioneering steps here at Climate Etc. – but I had to drop the debate about propriety because he got so upset and I became concerned about his well-being.
Thanks for the link.
Dr. Curry, I don’t think you have said it here (maybe I just missed it) but you addressed the issue of expressing certainty in public while expressing doubt in private when you discussed Dr. Kevin Trenberth and his (as you called it) hypocrisy. Maybe it’s implicit, but it should be made explicit: it is dishonest (hypocritical, violating integrity, lying) to express in testimony and editorials and other public places that the science is certain, while saying in private that it has serious inadequacies.
If research reports and data is locked away from academic examination and testing, then it should be ignored for political purposes even if the scientist(s) advocate adoption and urgent change on their word without minute examination of their work. This rule would alone provide incentive to open data and reporting to scientific examination.
The sole focus on peer-reviewed publications in professional society journals is short-sighted as follows. Firstly, that system is not properly set up to allow for the depth of review that many aspects of the problem demand: computer software is a good example. The level of detail needed to replicate much of the software simply cannot be accommodated in such papers and journals. Secondly, the journal-article peer-review process is better known for what it is not possible to do than known for what it can do. Thirdly, it is actually not necessary for all the general public to be aware of all the procedures and processes that are used to obtain a qualified calculational result. It is necessary for only the regulator and the regulated ( regulatee ) to be aware of all these aspects. Privately-funded, business-propritary aspects remain unknown to the general public, by the simple process of releasing non-proprietary and proprietary versions of reports. The public must then be ensured that the regulator is properly carrying out its jobs with the absolute upmost of technical expertise and the absolute complete lack of inappropriate relationships between the regulator and the re pripotary gulatee.
At one extreme, some activities that have the potential to affect the health and safety of the public are carried out in complete secrecy: does any one know, for example, how and when nuclear-based weapons are transported from the place of manufacturing to the places where they are positioned for use? Or non-nulcear weapons for that matter. Many military aircraft also fall under this approach. At the other extreme, public projects that are carried out completely within the National Laboratory systems have not a single secret aspect. There you will find all details needed for replication and Independent reviews by the hundreds.
One approach to a system that would allow reporting and independent, detailed, in-depth review of all aspects would be for the organizations conducting the work to produce reports that are more nearly sufficiently detailed to allow for replication. If the work is carried out with public funding this should already be the SOP in Climate Science. Thousands and thousands of such reports are produced by National Laboratories around the world each year. If one insists that their journal peer-reviewed publications simply be added up to a sum, they can easily extract sufficient material from such reports to submit a paper. This approach has the added benefit that the material will have been subjected to peer review prior to submittal for peer review. Additionally, the internal peer-review will be better by far that offered by peer-reviewed journals.
The general public, and most of the non-general public, will not have computing equipment sufficient to successfully carry out any useful calculation with any modern GCM. Most will also lack the expertise and experience to carry out truly production-grade applications. Regulatory agencies are known to require that regulated organizations supply them with the software plus training for production-grade applications of the software.
Underscore:
“If one insists that their journal peer-reviewed publications simply be added up to a sum, they can easily extract sufficient material from such reports to submit a paper. This approach has the added benefit that the material will have been subjected to peer review prior to submittal for peer review. Additionally, the internal peer-review will be better by far that offered by peer-reviewed journals.”
If your literature is gray, and you want it in a scientific assessment report, submit it to a journal. Of course, issues remain with the evaluation of the journals themselves, but on the whole I think this is a good recommendation.
Judith
This bit caught my eye
“Looking ahead, what changes in the research environment do you anticipate over the next 10 years that will affect research integrity? What will be the most difficult challenges?”
We are moving from a system where information invariably came from print sources -such as journals or books- to one where digital information is key.
The problem with this as I know from a govt agency I work with, is that if its not been digitised the information almost doesn’t exist. I found this even with reports compiled by the govt agency themselves 5 or 10 years or more ago. It’s only if a long time employee knew of the research and could physically locate it that it would be considered.
A huge amount of stuff doesnt get digitised for one reason or another so starts to disappear into the realms of anecdotal information so disliked by certain denizens. It may subsequently be replaced by models using data of a theoretical nature so real life ‘anecdotal’ material becomes replaced by stuff that is ‘modeldotal’ but because it came from a digital source is considered to be superior.
I saw that in action at the Met office when I researched my article The long slow thaw. Very little of the information in sometimes fragile 150 year old books is even looked at.
Conversely of course there are some high level digitisation projects going on such as that of ships logs, but generally our body of certain historic material is being gradually lost. NOAA are good at putting on line certain material but there is a great deal missing
tonyb
I especially liked your addressing of explicit consensus building in the sciences. Your use of the word “explicit” distinguishes the undesirable consensus building that you describe from implicit consensuses that arise when scientific knowledge reaches a point that certain ideas become widely accepted on their own merits, as opposed to seeking ratification of them by professional society apparatchiks. What you wrote is balanced and reasonable. It would be good to see the sciences return to it.
tonyb –
Interesting observations.
And very perceptive to foresee the likely decline towards modeldotal material.
A trend worth resisting methinks..
Anteros
Yes, I think modeldotal information will become the norm no matter its value.
tonyb
Integrity: Richard Feynman Cargo Cult Science
“I’m talking about a specific, extra type of integrity that is not lying, but bending over backwards to show how you are maybe wrong”
“Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be given, if you know them. . . the idea is to try to give all of the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or another.”
Fact: CO2 is a linear symetrical molecule that can only be induced to have a dipole moment at the vibrational modes resonant with 2.3 4.2 and 14.77microns of which only the 14.77 micron bend mode is within the range of wavelengths radiated by the Earth and the 1970 Nimbus 4 satellite measurements of the Earth’s radiative spectrum showed that the 14.77micron band was already so close to saturation that increased CO2 could have at best just a negligioble effect.
In 1981 Hansen wrote a paper falsely claiming that CO2 had an effect between 7microns and 14microns:
28 August 1981, Volume 213, Number 4511 SCIENCE
Climate Impact of Increasing Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide
J. Hansen, D. Johnson, A. Lacis, S. Lebedeff P. Lee, D. Rind, G. Russell
“Carbon dioxide absorbs in the atmospheric “window” from 7 to 14 micrometers which transmits thermal radiation emitted by the earth’s surface and lower atmosphere. Increased atmospheric CO2 tends to close this window and cause outgoing radiation to emerge from higher, colder levels, thus warming the surface and lower atmosphere by the socalled
greenhouse mechanism (5). The most sophisticated models suggest a
mean warming of 2° to 3.5°C for doubling of the CO2 concentration from 300 to 600 ppm (6-8).
SCIENCE, VOL. 213, 28 AUGUST 1981″
“7 to 14 micrometers ” covers a broad range over which CO2 has no effect but apparently Hansen included this in his model which produced “2° to 3.5°C for doubling of the CO2 concentration from 300 to 600 ppm”
Hansen’s model #4 in this paper produced warming of 2.78°C from a doubling of CO2 which miraculously is identical to the value obtained by the CO2 forcing parameter 5.35ln(2) = 3.71W/m^2 and the climate sensitivity factor 0.75°C/W/m^2 (3.71 x 0.75 = 2.78) but neither of these is mentioned in this 1981 paper.
In late 1978 satellites were laiunched that measured OLR giving Hansen over eight years of OLR data to verify his hypothesis that increased CO2 emissions were resulting in increased atmospheric insulation redfucing OLR and this trapped ourgoing longwave radiation wasd the causitive agent for the observed global warming.
In spite of measurements that showed an increase in OLR instead of Hansen’s predicted decrease demonstrating conclusively that there was no possible enhanced greenhouse effect from increased CO2: Hansen stood before Congress on June 23, 1988 falsely claiming that this enhanced greenhouse effect was occurring at an accelerated rate panicking the science deficient Congress into action on reducing CO2 emissions to stop this non existant CO2 induced enhanced greenhouse effect.
Hansen did this based on the same computer models used in 1981 only this time the output demonstrated far more catastrophic global warming.
Since 1988 none of the model projections ever materialized in spite of CO2 emissions increases exceeding the levels on which Hansen based his predictions. The satellite measurements of OLR still don’t detect any enhanced greenhouse effect from the 57.1% increase in CO2 emissions since 1979, and in spite of the continued increase in CO2 emissions global warming not only officially ended by 1998 according to all five global temperature datasets the world has been cooling since 2002!
It is quite clear that Hansen is no disciple of Feynman and does not ascribe to Feynman’s words: “I’m talking about a specific, extra type of integrity that is not lying, but bending over backwards to show how you are maybe wrong”
Norm,
“The satellite measurements of OLR still don’t detect any enhanced greenhouse effect from the 57.1% increase in CO2 emissions since 1979”
Link?
The concept that an enhanced greenhouse effect prevents energy from escaping manifests itself in a reduction of energy from the Earth radiating into space. This energy is called outgoing longwave radiation (OLR).
http://www.climate4you.com under the heading Global temperature has Outgoing Longwave Radiation Global under headings fifth from the bottom.
If you scroll down you will get to a plot of global temperature and Outgoing Longwave radiation. The graph is averaged over 37 months to reduce the effect from the annual seasonal variation.
If you draw a straight line on the OLR 37 month average you will see that it is increasing and not decreasing as would happen if the greenhouse effect was actually being enhanced by CO2.
As far as emissions there are several sources but the most comprehensive source is the BP statistical reveiw of energy which contains spread sheets for every concievable factor including CO2 emissions by country.
Download the “Workbook” under Historical Data at this site and wade through it for the appropriate emissions data.
http://www.bp.com/sectionbodycopy.do?categoryId=7500&contentId=7068481
In 1979 emissions were 19,637.7mt and in 2010 they reached 33,158.4mt according to this data.
I prefer going back to basic data rather than accept what people say because the same data with appropriate statistical manipulation can show whatever trend anyone wants to put on it.
Norm, For a physical system, the integrated incoming and outgoing radiation can be equal at various points in time, yet the emitting temperatures can differ. And that’s what matters. You will be surprised at how trivially this can be demonstrated.
I wonder why the IAC couldn’t have figured these things out for themselves. Are these new concepts to scientists? This looks like another project to provide busy work for yet another bunch of useless bureaucrats. I am sure that they will implement about none of your suggestions, Judith.
I can imagine about 150 joshs running randomly around IAC headquarters bumping into each other. This stuff is not serious.
There are that many interrelated disciplines in our modern world, not one should render itself infallible.
A independent panel across the pure sciences, with a philosophy of reductionism. Specifically to adjudicate if the hypnosis or theory, does not breach the barrier between science and biased philosophies.
By the knowing that I know, a proclamation is made.
Arrhenioushansenous has been slain, by the hand of a man.
Rejoice, for the fear of climate is no more.
The most powerful force in the Universe, is the reasoning of a man.
Markus Fitzhenry.
PS.
Judith, they wanted the street fight, and now they have black eyes.
Dear Dr. Curry,
re: All scientific materials upon which regulations & policies are based should be publicly available and easily accessible (online)
It occurred to me on the subject of paywalled public policy research that publicly funded research grants could simply be required by the funding agency to include the ‘cost of publishing’ — which would be the cost charged by the journal publishing the study results to place the resultant paper in front of the paywall, rather than behind.
Journals could develop a business plan and limited use copyright that would allow them to thus publish these papers, make them publicly available, and still financially prosper.
Maybe someone with nuts-and-bolts experience in scientific publishing could weigh in on this.
Dear Dr Curry,
I really like your analysis of science itself, risk management, ethic…
The way to describe pathologic consensus, politicized science, is much more clear that my intuition.
You probably don’t know, because you are deep into the controversy of climate. To be honest, as an engineer, I no more care because the problem is solved… sorry, but in 5 years AGW will be forgotten, either because it happens despite no CO2 emitted, or because it does not happens because no CO2 emited. each camp will declare victory, and business wil focus on more funny thing like vacation and going to mars…
but what you talk about, consensus, ethic in science is the key of that solution, and the delay it tooks to be able to see it.
How could we ignore that, while believing in photovoltaic energy, or even wind generators as a global solution… For me it is because of non corp lobbies, the same as climate lobbies, and corp that adapt to catch the wagon, like on climate.
I beg as low as I can, that you dare to look at the data that I refer to you with and open an critic mind . I know that it is hard to believe, because we have been taught cold fusion is bad science.
just hearing the spawar video, and reading the defkalion announce and comments, could give you interest in continuing.
A greek company, Defkalion have make a press release ,
http://www.defkalion-energy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5529#p5529
calling for independent test, with a simple and “no hidden rabbit” protocol that would give no doubt, that their cold fusion reactor DO work.
the problem is solved.
if they are faking all, I will accept that Apollo and 9/11 may be a fake and eart might be flat, because it would be … so improbable.
the science is real as US Navy Spawar tried to prove with peer review and 100% repeatable experiments, before they get shut down because of too much media noise.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VymhJCcNBBc
consensus silenced them for 3 years…
now Nasa discretely admit it is real
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/sensors/PhySen/research.htm
and some associate researcher try to communicate pretending being forced by FOIA
http://technologygateway.nasa.gov/media/CC/lenr/lenr.html
please forget about the very mediatic andrea rossi, whom I don’t trust much to tell the truth, but Who, I’m sure have a working yet unstable reactor (reengineered from scratch, from Sci papers, by Defkalion… just a normal corp of engineer that see both a working reactor and bad engineering)… Good he ask help from National Instruments…
National instruments after a modest press release, created the 15january an internal community on LENR, and also hot superconduction and othet solid state theory… https://decibel.ni.com/content/groups/lenr
it seems closed today… like spawar…
consensus killed again.
there are many other information you might catch, but the subject of your article get absolutely acute :
How can a community and even a planet get into a false and stupid consensus, while it is not their interest…
I don’t believe ins the conspiracy theory of oil or nuke that have suppresses LENR. it is simply conservatism and consensus that block all… fear of looking stupid, fear of the colleagues, group delusion…
and if consensus is not enough, you have group influence on magazine, fraud, administrative pressure…
exactly the same kind of self delusion we see on climate, on some medical fears… the one Roland Benabou proposed a model…
about ethic, there is an example in cold fusion, because Eugene Malove have explained an denounced the fraud of the team at MIT that have bent the results of their cold fusion experiments so it looks failed…
http://www.infinite-energy.com/images/pdfs/mitcfreport.pdf
he was the only one to be able to see it, beside the conspirator, because as the chief editor of mit he has seen the papers before the fraud…
look so much like many frauds in climate (It won’t be honest not to admit that it happens on both side)…
really I beg you to consult the data, maybe first the video of your colleague at US Navy Spawar… 1 hour of conference, and the beginning which might be a shock for you (yes CF is published in peer reviewed journals and reproduced 100%)…
second look at defkalion announces, but also the specification, and all the data their give on their forum.
they really seems to be real good engineers, serious professionals, yet not really scientist… just a gang of engineer that found 3rd millennium energy, and decide to build useful device like furnace and boiler.
I have been shocked that so many serious people don’t even accept to see or read papers form serious organization, simply because they promote an idea that is non-consensual…
I’me very cautious with belief, not even believing in usually accepted conspiracy , because I think that stupidity, hate and greed explain more much than conspiracy …
if you don’t accept to consult the given references,
wait 2 month that defkalion have arranged the test, and think about what happens…
that even you, the Jean d’arc of science, get manipulated like any physicist, to respect the law of consensus, despite the available data…
because since the beginning, the data where there.
I’ve read a thousands abstract in 93 and doubt was not an option.
best regards,
and thanks for the nice article, that raise maybe the biggest scientific problem of the last 30 years.
Alain,
From the comments by stk:
“The key thing there is that it must be calibrated and the only way to properly calibrate is to allow variable input energy flow to the “empty” unit. You need apply that energy flow over time to reach a reasonably stable temperature (stasis), then plot the data point pair. Change the energy flow (higher or lower) and wait for a stable internal temp (this may take hours) and plot another point. It takes a minimum of two points to get a slope and three or more (five at least) to get a non-linear curve. During that time you really cannot have any external variable changes such as changes in airflow over the surface or through the unit. One measured variable change, one new stasis temperature point. If you vary anything else, the data will be useless (or fraudulent).
ONLY THEN can you even begin to approximate the energy “gain”. You are really measuring two things: 1) the overall latent heat of the “box”, i.e. how much input power is needed to raise the internal temp by a single degree and 2) what is the rate of loss to the outside world created by the delta-T.
The hotter the insides, the greater the rate of loss and that’s where the waiting until stasis is important. Until the temperature stabilizes, you don’t know if the change in temp is due to losses or sensible heat (or even phase change heat!). You can use a number of methods to change the rate of input energy flow – variable voltage transformer, triac circuit (needs a true RMS volt/amp meter or a real, on the wall type watt hour meter). You can even use a simple on/off variable duty controller in fixed mode.
A real test of ANY value will require a no-nonsense practical engineer or scientist who won’t put up with ANY external variable changes. It’s not too hard to correct for changes in ambient but any changes in airflow over or though the unit are a no-no.
That’s why flow calorimetry is to be preferred. It’s an easy mass flow/delta-T that takes into account both sensible heat and possibly heat of vaporization (given how hot this thing can supposedly get).
Anyone who thinks you can do a ‘test’ with less control over variables is just asking to get hoodwinked.
Ok, so the gauntlet is thrown down on what will constitute a meaningful test. If these guys are flakes, they won’t allow control of only a single variable. If they don’t they are likely frauds.”
Don’t bet on it, Alain.
I agree pretty well completely with what you wrote, Judy. Two things particularly caught my attention.
(1) The pay-wall problem. So much of what is published in journals, maybe 90% of it, has been produced through public money. We have a problem here. The journals are important and we need them to continue to exist, yet as a citizen taxpayer I feel that I have a right to be able to read what has been produced in my country with my money. If that is accepted, then we need some mechanism to at least protect me from decisions made on material behind pay walls. Indeed, even governments need to be so protected, I think. You suggest that governments make no decisions based on material behind pay walls, but governments will in fact act on advice from those who have that access. You then suggest that everything be freely available after six months. I agree. Who is to compel that? How? Some journals now provide free access for the first few months, which is a start.
(2) Acting from supposed expertise. At what point does a scientist/expert stop to say that area X is not one where his expertise enables him to speak? You suggest that each of us has an ethical imperative to stop short when we reach that limit. I agree, but it is difficult for many to understand where that limit is. Those who are bowled over by what they have discovered can often see all sorts of good things that might happen, if their hunch is followed, and the press on with recommendations.
I have a role in road safety, and some fifteen years’ experience in commissioning research, comprehending the outcome, reading other published research, and making recommendations to government. I am sometimes asked, given the very much greater morbidity and mortality risks in riding motorbikes, why I don’t recommend that motorbikes be banned. That question throws up a limit to me. My usual answer is that were I to go down that path, what would stop me from recommending that all dangerous activity be banned, like parachuting, rock-climbing, and the like? My job is, rather, to present what our research shows, make recommendations that might reduce mortality and morbidity, and let government decide what ought to happen. I have no knowledge or expertise in parachuting, rock-climbing or any other dangerous human activity. I could go on to say that I don’t think banning behaviour that humans want to engage in makes a great deal of sense, but that’s a much wider issue, and again, I have no particular competence in that either.
These are tricky issues, but then, the whole AGW business is tricky, and I like what you put forward.
Don –
Very well said. I particularly agree with your second point about the limits of expertise.
I admire your ability to identify and remain within the limits of your field. What about situations where there is power, prestige and money blurring the edges? What if there is also competition for influence? The addition of some ideology and agendas? Also, and perhaps most importantly a large constituency of people asking for your expertise but in areas beyond the limits of your training and competence – and perhaps even the limits of your[/one’s] whole discipline?
This seems to me to be the case in climate science, where individuals find themselves pronouncing on the fate of cities, countries, ecosytems and whole civilisations – merely because they ran a model about transient climate sensitivity.
In this situation, if the self-restraint isn’t sufficient, I think it’s up to non-scientists to ask if these people have a privileged insight into the matters about which they speak so confidently.
“it’s up to non-scientists to ask if these people have a privileged insight into the matters about which they speak so confidently.”
Those questions will not be answered … NO public debate, remember ?
Judith C
Your quote from above:
” However, if a scientist or community of scientist does identify a possible risk, it is responsible behavior for these scientists to engage with health professionals or engineers or whoever is appropriate to clarify and better understand the risk. Alarmism about possible risks is as irresponsible as hiding risks”
Accurate comment. No way back for you now; you are forever a target for the complete panoply of ad hom attack … but I’m sure by now that you’re as inured to this as others
Oh, and the MSM will stop ringing you for comment (probably a blessing)
” So I do not see it as an obligation of scientists to communicate public risks associated with their research. However, if a scientist or community of scientist does identify a possible risk, it is responsible behavior for these scientists to engage with health professionals or engineers or whoever is appropriate to clarify and better understand the risk. Alarmism about possible risks is as irresponsible as hiding risks. ”
Well, this scenario would certainly put the clamp down on a normal public discussion. If a scientist finds risk it most certainly is a moral obligation to let that be known to the widest audience possible. No climate scientist can know exactly every societal risk, so information on increased drought, increased sea levels, or whatever possible change identified in the research should be not be held back by 1) subjective ideas about what it means to be “politicized” or 2) tyrannical arbiters.
Another good example of how Climate ethical inquires go, this time at Yale;
http://junkscience.com/2012/01/24/emanuel-responds-to-junkscience-charge/
I’m sure they will just jump right onto the list above when given the chance.
Judith Curry
A great summary. Your responses are spot on.
I would have only one small addition.
Under the use of grey material you state:
I agree wholeheartedly, but would add:
Max
Manacker,
I agree that Judith did a great job with this summary. I generally agree with your “small addition” but suggest a clear definition of the standard that has to be met for that material to be considered reliable and objective scientific information and thus appropriate to use for policy decisions should be included.
Manacker,
I agree that Judith did a great job with this summary. I generally agree with your “small addition” but suggest a clear definition of the standard that has to be met for that material to be considered reliable and objective scientific information and thus appropriate to use for policy decisions should be included.
The use of grey material should always be qualified and shortcomings of the material adequately acknowledged. If grey material from advocacy or lobbyist groups is used to provide a rationale for any policy application that material should be fully available (raw data, methodology, and results) so that the use of that information can be independently confirmed as reliable and objective scientific information.
My apologies for the fomatting problems. No clue how it happened
Perhaps a legacy of climate “skeptics” constantly denigrating the process of peer review and the process by which we fund research in this country?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NXIR9ve0JU0
I would guess, according to much of what I read in these here parts, this must be a good thing.
Note to the chief – check out Australia on the map. What’s up with that?
Are you for real?
The reason EU wasted so much is because they are the most scarred of all. They are land locked.
And a bunch of greenie, lefto, warmist to boot.
Do your work on caring for the biology of the earth’s surface.
No, I think a culture of big green and institutional interests over hyping and over stating risks and accuracy of results is starting to be seen for the over priced bs it is.
hunter –
So if I got you right – “[A] culture of big green and institutional interests over hyping and over stating risks and accuracy of results” is selectively affecting the rate at which peer reviewed papers are coming out of different countries?
So “greens and environmental interests” have a stronger influence on how science is conducted in this country than anywhere in Europe and in Japan?
Really? I didn’t know that.
Joshua,
My memory is not what it used to be. Please remind where I was speaking of Japan or Europe? Or were you simply unable to follow a brief argument?
I don’t think climate “skeptics” denigrating the process of peer review has done anything: they are a tiny drop in the bucket of scientific research, in a field that is but a tiny drop in a bucket of all the disciplines in science that are studied.
The real problem is the exponential increase in paper retractions that have occurred over the last 20 years. This suggests the first line of review, the peer-review process, is being overwhelmed by the sheer number of papers that are being done, now that it is so easy to publish in this electronic age. But at the same time, the secondary post-publish review process is working well enough. The problem is the perception this creates in the public when bad science is retracted–a good sign of a working system, but they expect science to be perfect from step one.
Science is a methodological process of obtaining information, but I fear the media and lower schools have created a mythological view of science as a “thing” that is perfect and unerring. So if errors happen, people start to distrust this “thing” of science, rather than give it the understand it deserves as a process where finding errors and correcting them are an integral part.
The way the media portrays scientific discourse also does not help! A good example of if anything has affected the public’s view on science, the discussions over the effects of vitamin supplementation is probably one of the big ones. The media painted that as some conflict, while really it was a discussion of levels and times of vitamin intakes in regards to life span (too much C and E, and some forms of A, taken daily over prolonged times decreases your life span, or conversely increases all case mortality in a population).
It’s kinda one of those “they say it is good, and now they say it isn’t? Who can we trust?!” issues, at least as the media made it out to be, from what I read of it. And if you push policy based on science out of overconfidence, once that is inevitably shown, that also makes the public become wary and distrustful, and in turn government funding to go down. The public distrusts used car salesmen, so when science is pushed on them with outrageous claims that unerringly dry up, that’s what they come to see us as, even if it isn’t us scientists behind such ludicrous over applications of our data.
It’s a complex issue, but the exponential increase in paper retractions (here’s a cool site that tracks but a fraction of higher profile ones http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/ ) really is a major issue under the hood for modern science and its perception, and overconfident proclamations based upon such.
Thanks for the summary Ged. I have retracted one abstract in my career and it is a humbling experience. Due to the publish-or-perish mindset, some researchers gamble on a claim thinking they will have results for a conference paper.
If it doesn’t work out, you have a missing presentation, and try again next time. Retracted abstracts don’t show up in the records since nothing gets published
If Atheism is the height of intellectual hubris then Climatolgoy must be the the height of scientific hubris.
“Climatolgoy”?? Whatta you got against goys? >:(
;p
JC;
Good summaries, good assessments. Getting closer and closer to getting the bell attached to the cat.
As you note and imply, it is despicable that these hearings are “in camera”, with no information findable except through “insider” connections. It really makes one
questiondoubtdiscount their bona fides.Judith – please do you have link to you .ppt slide set?
It’s unfair to compare ”the phony GLOBAL WARMING researchers” with the research done in other disciplines. Brilliant researches are done in other fields; unfortunately, because of professional fear-mongering in climatology – they get the money / publicity ON THE WEST > no enough money left for the honest professions – they are cannibalizing the researches in other / in the essential / honest professions… Confusing the constant climatic changes with the phony GLOBAL warming is not a science. 2] misleading the masses that they know when GLOBAL temperature goes up, or down; by monitoring on 6000m3 of air is a grotesque crime, not science.
Science is: checking and double checking – not to overlook something. Silencing all the proofs from me is not a science; but, gang bullying, Strenuously hiding the skeletons in their closet… the stench is increasing by the day, from both camps!!!.Laws of physics don’t permit GLOBAL warming. Localized warmings can happen and always does. Extreme localized warmings are very bad – not just because is warmer, but because of the laws of physics; to balance, other place / places, gets extreme colder. Debating: if is better warmer planet is fruitless / stupid. Because extra WARMER one hemisphere means extra cold the other hemisphere. Unless my formulas are scrutinized, climatology shouldn’t be called ”scientific research”
EC>AS>LHR (Extra Coldness> Atmosphere Shrinks > Less Heat Releases)
EH>AE>ECI (Extra Heat > Atmosphere Expands > Extra Coldness Intercepts)
For me research integrity and responsibility means to always tell the truth, according to the data.
For example, instead of what we hear every day that the global warming is continuing by using new methodology and obfuscations, someone with integrity does is to compare his prediction made 7 years ago with the observation, as shown below.
CRU’s global mean temperature (GMT) data for 2011 is out.
It is 0.34 deg C. (http://bit.ly/55TKj6)
Here is the comparison of observation with IPCC’s models.
http://bit.ly/z7cOHe
For 2011, model prediction for emission at 2000 level was 0.5 deg C.
For 2011, model prediction was 0.6 deg C.
The observed value is about half that was predicted.
AGW is not supported by the data SO FAR.
That would be the conclusion of someone who has scientific integrity.
Girma | January 26, 2012 at 9:55 pm |
For me research integrity and responsibility means to always tell the truth, according to the data.
Girma, no scientist with integrity will release data which says: the planet is warmer by 0,34C. By monitoring on 6 000m3 of air, on concentrated places…
2] Antarctic / Greenland are almost as large as USA, but monitored on couple of places. If the weather report for every day in USA is given only the temperature on couple of places for Florida, to cover the whole of US; people wouldn’t taken them seriously. See when temp for next day in Florida goes up by a degree, does on every place in USA goes up by that much; remember what Stefan said. Then consider the mid Pacific, 15 times larger than USA, with no monitoring. Releasing data by 0,35, or any other misleading is only fodder for the sceptical Smarties. If any common sense by the Skeptics, IPCC wouldn’t be releasing / spreading B/S, to feed the B/S ADDICTS. Have a good appetite, and keep the wool over your eyes
Science is not a science; if predicting Global warming – then the heat is missing The missing heat is gone on the other side of the sun. When the troposphere warms up EXTRA, for any reason; the vertical winds increase / circulation of air increases > wastes more heat and equalizes in a jiffy. I.e. in Sahara gets from 45C during the day – down to 5C at night. In 12h cooling of 40C. On the other hand, in Brazil gets from 33C during the day – down to 24C at night. Because in Sahara the vertical winds are STRONGER – in 12h cools by 30C MORE than in Brazil, in 12h. THE SELF ADJUSTING MECHANISM CAN COOL DOWN THE TEMPERATURE ON THE WHOLE TROPOSPHERE BY 30C IN LESS THAN 12H, IF NECESSARY; how come cannot cool 2C in 100years!!! Climatology is the Red’s religion, not science
When the vertical wind is stronger – is like ”faster convayer belt” releases extra heat into the unlimited coldness – because of the fast orbiting of the planet – that missing heat (if you consider the movement of the solar system) is GONE by now one light year away. THE VERTICAL WINDS ARE THE CONVAYER BELT FOR REGULATING THE WARMTH, NOT CO2!!! That ”convayer belt” can speed up, and slow down, as necessary. My theory will win. When air warms up – nothing can stop it off expanding. When atom bomb explodes – the expanding oxygen / nitrogen are demolishing concrete buildings. It’s not the 10-20kg of plutonium that is demolishing the buildings, but the expanding O+N, can some smog prevent expanding off O+N? ( In atom bomb explosion is lots of smog, but O+N are not prevented of expanding) For how long more my proofs / facts / formulas will be ridiculed / silenced?. Silencing my theories, that all can be proven NOW, going for ”maybe in 100 years” is not a science, but gang bullying!.
When the sea gets warmer for ANY reason > evaporation increases > clouds increase. Clouds are the earth’s ”sun umbrella; reflect some sunlight / clouds intercept some sunlight, WHERE COOLING IS MUCH MORE EFFICIENT, than on the ground (less sunlight reaches the ground). plus clouds produce rain and bring extra coldness from high up. Plus what rain falls on the land, evaporates – evaporation is refrigeration process. For science that water vapour is a bad gas, is not a science; but an evil cult.
G’day,
I disagree entirely with Mike. They have all been tedious leg-humping nags stripped bare of any virtue save annoyance. I was debating on whether I could usefully anything to this debate when I noticed Joshua’s invitation. Typically puerile and without any merit at all – so I felt I should fit right in. I am after all flash as a dunny rat with a gold tooth and am contemplating a new career as a pirate hijacking threads for no particular purpose other than to amuse myself. I was also contemplating being a cowboy – but that’s just because Lanie Lane is just so darned hot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec_lw2JXeIY
But this brings me to my major proposal – turning climate science into a competitive dance sport – vaudeville, hoochie coochie, burlesque, pole dancing, lap dancing – it makes little difference although I bags not being involved in a lap dance with Gavin Schmidt, Jim Hansen or Fred Moolten.
I understand that Joshua has major experience with leg humping and may be induced to volunteer. The winner gets to introduce a climate policy for a day. This avoids the problem of scientific ethics entirely and can result in very little damage to the environment or economy – at a defined risk of busting your sides laughing or alternatively throwing up.
I don’t know why I should be upset about a distorted image of Australia. This is an improvement as most Americans confuse Australia with Austria and think we are part of the New Prussian Empire somewhere in the South Pacific or Patagonia – and with an extensive range of deadly wildlife. “Any sharks?” “No, mate, the crocodiles ate them.”
As an Australian and an honorary sceptic – I have been known to accuse real sceptics of sniffing bicycle seats for sexual pleasure – I am perfectly placed to sell the television rights. We could combine competitive climate pole dancing with deadly wildlife and extreme weather in a show set in Patagonia called – ‘I’m a climate scientist get me out of here’. You’ll have to excuse me now – I have an idea to pitch.
Robert I Ellison
Chief Hydrologist
Chief,
You would be a great addition on “American Idle” or one of the other fulminating infections passing as modern televisual entertainment these days.
Thanks for the great writing. You are truly a Renaissance man- climate, humor, writing and dancing.
Chief,
I stand corrected.
Yeah, those salt water crocs are mean
But what about our cattle who’ve learnt to roll over road grids on their backs to get through fences ?
I told that to some Koreans in a Central Queensland pub one evening and they believed me – so it must be true
Mate,
Don’t forget the dropbears.
http://www.dropbearaware.com/
If you are in Central Quensland we can catch up at my local. There are 2 places in the world where a cowboy can drink, spit, swear and ride bulls at the same time. The other is in Texas – man I love Texas.
Robbo the Yobbo
Chief Beer Taster
Great Australian Hotel Rockhampton
Sorry Robbo, wrong nail for the hat – I’m not a Q’lander (just worked there as a geo, admittedly often enough)
I quite like their laconic humour, though
Chief,
A better idea is to request the Team spend 6 months at sea in a tall ship, a la Moby Dick, to follow developments in natural oscillations, and measurements thereof. I see ‘climbing the rigging’, ‘keel-hauling (using a rowing boat), ‘walking the plank’ and many other diversions for our entertainment. As to Moby Dick, Captain Dallas fits the bill, complexion ‘n all.
‘Them that dies will be the lucky ones’
John I don’t think keel-hauling means what you think it does.
Wikipedia:
Keelhauling (Dutch kielhalen;[1] “to drag along the keel”; German Kielholen; Swedish kölhalning; Danish kølhaling; Norwegian kjølhaling)
is a form of punishment meted out to sailors at sea. The sailor was tied to a rope that looped beneath the vessel, thrown overboard on one side of the ship, and dragged under the ship’s keel, either from one side of the ship to the other, or the length of the ship (from bow to stern). As the hull was usually covered in barnacles and other marine growth, if the offender was pulled quickly, keelhauling would typically result in serious cuts, loss of limbs and even decapitation.
Brian,
I surely do, my friend. Under a rowing boat is hardly likely to be fatal: wet definitely! The quote from ‘Kidnapped’ fits the notion perfectly and echoes the Chief’s thoughts, ie all in fun.
On a more serious note, climate science needs outdoor activity to re-establish scientific credibility.
FWIW I think one of the major problems is that peer-review is rarely done rigorously (it seems) because expert peer-review is, in effect, a part time, unpaid activity. Having recently considered some details of the issues which need to be addressed as an integral part of peer-review, I realize that rigorous and effective peer-review is (or should be) a time consuming, non-trivial activity. It makes little sense for a team of researchers to spend months/years of their effort compiling a paper for publication when peer-review is so lightweight that it often receives perfunctory attention over hours or days. Where are the professional peer-reviewers – experts who spend, say 30% or more of their working hours (negotiable) doing rigorous review of manuscripts for journals? [Government regulatory agencies employ ‘evaluators’ who are tasked to perform critical assessments/evaluations of studies in medicine, engineering etc.] Yes, such people would expect to be remunerated commensurately and that would necessarily add to the cost of publishing. However, judging by the well publicized failures of the current peer-review/editorial processes substantial improvement is needed.
It is possible that the internet, if used appropriately, may not only reduce costs (c.f. paper version) but also enhance the peer-review process by facilitating more rapid and more widespread feedback on manuscripts which could be conditionally ‘published’ as ‘first-cut’/preliminary subject to satisfactory resolution of critical comments within a pre-determined time frame.
Another aspect of peer-review which is unclear to me is whether journals (other than in medical disciplines) issue checklists to the reviewers.
What do others think?
It has been a, mean to Josh, sort of a day, Eh!
Oscar time is coming up!
There won’t be a sci-fi flick vying for the best political documentary award this time.
But who will win the Oscar for best fiction story (in the climate category)?
Nominations are:
– the hockey shtick
– the hidden decline
– the not-so-hot spot
– the warming that stumbled
– the energy that hid and vanished
– the non-disappearing glaciers
– the imaginary crop disaster
– the non-endangered polar bear
– the point that refused to tip
And the winner is…
Look beyond the oceans, for there you will see, your brother, for they are yee.
Markus Fitzhenry.
(Re•duc•tion•ism
noun
1. The practice of analyzing and describing a complex phenomenon, esp. a mental, social, or biological phenomenon, in terms of phenomena that are held to represent a simpler or more fundamental level, esp. when this is said to provide a sufficient explanation
Reductionism can either mean (a) an approach to understanding the nature of complex things by reducing them to the interactions of their parts, or to simpler or more fundamental things or (b) a philosophical position that a complex system is nothing but the sum of its parts, and that an account of it can be reduced to accounts of individual constituents
[Wiki] )
That is the wiki on reducto, some simplifications do lead to greater understanding, imagine trying to teach kids the Science of Atmospheric without relating it to their understandings.
I have previously posted a little ditty, hopefully something like that can be taught to kids, so they understand more. And frankly, some of those lyrics that have been deposited by me, have also helped some of the greatest minds in the field to understand, the wrongness of the greenhouse paradigm.
The art. Roger Tattersall posted on Baron Fourier, and Hans Jelbring’s comments, nailed it for me. When I thought about the N&K principle, it clicked immediately. He did not distinguish the manner of mass, between its different composition, in the crust of the Earth. Looking on Fouriers observations, it was obvious Co2 meant very little to heat distribution in a straight line within the Earth.
Casting off greenhouse, I quickly saw the relationship of refrigeration when Rog posted that graph about the temperature throughout the atmosphere as stratified, I then imagined the greenhouse, as the glass only, and hence a new perspective.
But what mechanism drove our system. Clearly not a greenhouse, as its hotter at TOA. Then it struck, refrigeration heat pumps thermostats, condensers and evaporators, when logically applied to the natural systems of atmosphere, it gelled, like a bolt from Heaven.
To to be sure, I’m not sure it wasn’t.
Roger Tattersall, was the reason for my understandings, enough for a conception of an Idea. And Willis Eschenbachs perpetual motion machine made me think real hard, I don’t think people realise the advances that were made by many, because of his exercise. He is admirable.
Markus Fitzhenry.
“Is it responsible and ethical to hide research articles, based on publicly funded data, behind paywalls, as in the case of journals like Nature and Science, which are often financially prohibitive even to universities, let alone those in developing countries?”
“Scientific journals need to be economically viable to exist.
National and international assessments on policy relevant science should only use journal articles that are available in the public domain. Such a requirement would influence journal policies towards making articles publicly available after a certain time period (< 6 months)."
Brilliant response, Dr Curry!
manacker | January 27, 2012 at 4:32 am |
“Oscar time is coming up!
But who will win the Oscar for best fiction story (in the climate category)?”
I would nominate the theory that CO2 drives glacial-interglacial oscillations when CO2 changes occur about 10^3 years after the temperature changes they are supposed to be causing.
Who says that CO2 is the primary driver of glacial-interglacial oscillations?
This is vaguely connected to this thread. I would have loved to have seen Dr. Curry’s signature on this piece in the WSJ.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204301404577171531838421366.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
Jim, that will never fly, you know we should always freak out. Anything published in Nature is the Word of Science and should be heeded. That is why I have coffee, chocolate and red wine in my “may be bad this week” cabinet :)
Actually, this may be an interesting segue into the last part of the post title,scientific responsibility. A non-linear dynamic system changes what would be scientific responsibility.
Example, mixed-phase clouds. In the Arctic, the impact of mixed-phase clouds is large and being further studied. I assume, because to the complexity of non-linear dynamic systems, that similar mixed-phase cloud issues would exist in a smaller, more difficult to measure way in the tropics and sub-tropics. Comparing a rough energy balance from the surface to the tropopause and the surface to the TOA, I believe the ratio of the emissivity change is important to determine the impact of changes in radiant forcing. This is Maximum Local Emissivity Variance (MELV).
Dr. Curry knows well of the Arctic issues but is not concerned with the potential issue in the tropics and sub-tropics.
I may be right, she may be right or there may be some degree of rightness, that damn non-binary dealie.
I will continue to pursue the MELV situation and the ratio of atmospheric layer to surface layer radiant absorption, I am into thermodynamic boundary layers with their complicate transfer coefficients and response times. She may take a more holistic approach. Neither of us are responsible for our framing of the problem.
So how can you fault a scientist for having a scientific opinion? Or in this case, a scientist and a crackpot :)
Capt.,
If you look at a satellite, clouds do not like going uphill against a stronger force of centrifugal force.
Joe, I don’t like doing dishes, but they get done :) There is a big difference between likes and the laws of thermodynamics.
Indeedy.
Because, you know, shouting “Lysenko and talking of how “Many were sent to the gulag and some were condemned to death.” is the height of “scientific responsibility,” yo.
That’s some serious “scientific responsibility,” yo.
Capt.,
The LAWS of thermal dynamics do NOT include rotation, motion or centrifugal force.
Joshua, quick eat some bacon! You are wandering behind the little animals again :) There are many examples of science, good or bad, being used to manipulate. That is why doubt is a good thing and naivety a bad thing.
Di-hydrogen monoxide ring a bell?
Nice.
Lysenko.
Beautiful.
It’s an interesting question why Judith’s name isn’t on it.
Josh,
You’ve feigned that bit of outrage a few dozen times too many.
You are just hoping to fake being morally outraged in order to avoid dealing with the point. As usual.
Not outraged, hunter.
I think that kind of rhetoric is highly instructive.
It doesn’t outrage me in the least.
Not only am I not outraged, I’m not pretending faux “outrage” like some “skeptics” do when they rail against the politically incorrect usage of “denier.”
I see what types of rhetoric people use, and I comment on what it likely means.
No outrage.
The Lysenko reference is pretty extreme. I wonder how many other people they could have gotten to sign it with the Lysenko references removed?
billc –
I think that is a very interesting and useful question.
Again, I wonder why Judith didn’t sign it. Was she asked? If so, why didn’t she sign it; because of statements such as that one, or because of aspects of the scientific focus?
If more people would have signed it absent that reference, why wasn’t it simply removed?
So many questions!
If more people would have signed it absent that reference, why wasn’t it simply removed?
Short-sightedness?
“If more people would have signed it absent that reference, why wasn’t it simply removed?”
Fanaticisim?
I suspect a different explanation; one that speaks to the “motivated reasoning” of those who did sign – and it’s primacy w/r/t the thinking behind the editorial.
For scientists who are focused on an argument related to poorly quantified uncertainty to use that kind of rhetoric in a Wall Street Journal editorial speaks volumes, IMO. And it ain’t a pretty sound.
It’s like a giant sucking sound. Of advocacy sucking away scientific cred.
Joshua,
I doubt if you are as truly unself aware as you claim.
I’m glad a geneticist can tell me there is nothing to worry about.
My favorite is J. Scott Armstrong. Have you read some of the stuff that guy rights? His stuff on education is beautiful. The kind of product that can only come from the mind of an extremist libertarian.
Even Judith panned his Congressional testimony.
Sad to see those other scientists scraping the bottom of the barrel like that.
Really. It’s sad. But given Lindzen’s habit of comparing environmentalists to eugenicists – I guess it’s all par for the course in climate debate land.
er…writes. I hate it when I do that.
Especially one who is apparently unaware of the Alfred E. Neuman gene!
Joshua –
I’m straying into an area where I have no documented evidence, but has our good friend Lindzen made his analogy enough times for it to have become a ‘habit’?
Anteros –
I’m straying into an area where I have no documented evidence, but has our good friend Lindzen made his analogy enough times for it to have become a ‘habit’?
A fair question.
I’ve seen an essay that he wrote on that theme – but I’m not sure that it is a “habit” with him. Judging from the conspiratorial nature of much of what he has said about the debate, I wouldn’t find it surprising, but I don’t have evidence to back that claim.
Claim rescinded.
Jim;
That letter is, IMO, aimed at “candidates for office”, explicitly mentioned twice in the text. The spread of signatories, notably the last one (alphabetically), Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva , supports this supposition. As does the wording and lack of “hard science” stuff throughout.
Indeed. The “hard science”: and wording of analogies to Lysenko.
That “wording” and “hard science” speaks volumes. Have I said that before?
Judith,
Perhaps scientists should also be open to constructive criticisms?
Mind you, the whole area of temperature data study is garbage in trying to understand what created those temperatures and the circulation.
For scientists to truly embrace integrity, there needs to be a public acknowledgement that most studies are wrong. And the widespread misuse and abuse of statistics needs to be addressed.
Stan,
Do you honestly think scientists will do the honorable thing and “throw themselves on their swords”?
Many are still using the excuse of uncertainty and yet pushing that they are absolutely correct and should not be questioned.
Not just climate science. The misuse of statistics in the quest for the magic of 95% is everywhere. The social sciences are even worse.
All the warning signs are there. Academics will either clean up their mess or have it cleaned up for them.
Austerity is coming. We’ve run out of ‘other people’s money’. When govt research funding starts getting cut, I’d want to be someone who established a reputation for integrity.
Not least of said misuses is the selection of 95% as the magic criterion. The reason for setting high confidence levels (and not just, say, 51%) is to cut down to acceptable levels the chances of confirmation bias, data snooping, fraud, etc. 95% is nowhere near up to the job. It is used only in social pseudo-sciences, with predictable (>>99%) consequences (visions and revisions which a moment will reverse).
“The reason I was invited to engage with the IAC Project is that one of the Committee members is a regular reader of this blog!”
Interesting. I wonder about the criteria for selection. Perhaps Curry doesn’t say, because Curry doesn’t know. I have to say, such an unself-conscious, excited, flattered tone combined with zero insight about why being personally invited in the absence of information of an established outreach process is in some ways no different from what she says concerns her.
Unfortunately, Curry is in fact not someone many people will take seriously on ethics, integrity or responsibility, anymore.
Why? Because Curry ignores her own cyber-bullying of other scientists and many citizen scientists, fails to show the most basic understanding of front groups and think tanks and other sources of blatant disinformation and bad science, and has yet to make anything approximating a coherent ethical argument in favour of the kind of climate inaction she has promoted via this blog – never mind contributing to guiding any type of broader public discussion.
Climate change challenges many core beliefs and values, especially for conservatives like Curry. She doesn’t get it, and cannot differentiate between exposing this, and discussing the important role of rational skepticism and uncertainty in science and climate ethics.
It’s like watching a desperate contestant in an amateur talent contest.
Gong. :-(
“conservatives like Curry”
As a conservative myself, I am completely offended by the staggering idiocy of this.
Andrew
Martha,
Judith is a collosus (collosa?) of science. What is your claim to fame? Did you eat all the muffins?
Martha, very entertaining. Now go back and read beyond my statement that at least one person on the committee reads my blog, and actually read the content of my arguments.
Honesty, integrity and responsibility are far more important in science than collegiality among scientists. I am interested in improving the integrity and responsibility of climate science, not in s***ing up to other scientists (most of whom I do not know on a personal level).
Judith, please go back and try responding to what someone actually says. You almost never reflect. It’s very telling.
I actually always read the posts on which I comment.
Today, my comment is of a more general nature. Basically, I suggest it’s an unfortunate consequence of what I noted that you are increasingly isolated and not considered objective by other researchers or the public. Do you think that this helps you to support public participation and input? Just wondering.
p.s. If I meant ‘collegiality’, I would say ‘collegiality’. I said ‘cyberbullying’. I suggest the more important point is not your (real or imagined) role in relation to colleagues but your cyberbullying of the public who are not your denizens. This, too, is an ethical concern if you understand ethics broadly and deeply enough.
You fail in your accountability to science and the public. I appreciate that since this rings true for you, you react so strongly to it. However, in all honesty, it’s incredible that someone with a PhD responds in a way that makes your use of ideology to mask personal interests and obedience to Right-wing power so completely transparent. :-(
On second thought, I guess that’s a good thing. It’s not exactly a searing contribution, but it is what it is. Fair enough. :-)
Martha, try responding to content of what I write, and not merely provide you negative comments and judgment about my “behavior” without any supporting arguments and then claim that your opinions represent “other researchers and the public.” If you discuss the content of what I write, then maybe we can have a discussion of substance. As it stands, your diatribes merely serve to remind the readers of my tolerance and fairness in allowing such posts here.
I don’t talk about my personal politics on the blog, but it is a matter of public record that I contributed fairly substantially to Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. So trying to explain my behavior as some sort of right wing motivation is really pointless.
Ma Judy, keep it up; you must be doing something right. Each sibling claims you favor the other. How can you be so unfair?
==================
Dr. Curry,
If Martha, Louise, or Joshua were to be restricted as you suggest, they would have little to write.
Martha –
You should be amazed that a host has the decency to let such puerile insults stay unmoderated.
Did a ‘Curry’ steal your cookies in a previous life?
The most ignorant aspect of your diatribe is that until very recently Dr C was a firm supporter of the IPCC position and the consensus in general.
What amazes me is that you reveal not objectivity, but the opposite, and think your obeisance to this blog’s viewpoint is a signpost of intelligence.
I’m very aware of the history of the conversation. Your protectiveness is not exactly a counter-analysis, Anteros.
Still, your hostility interests me. Keep it up: it’s a signpost for the work of female progressives. Hint: we’re often not in agreement with Curry or The Men of the Blog. ;-)
Martha said;
‘Basically, I suggest it’s an unfortunate consequence of what I noted that you are increasingly isolated and not considered objective by other researchers or the public.’
Citations for these assertions please Martha?
tonyb
Mirror, mirror, on the wall. Who’s the most hostile of them all?
================
Martha –
It is telling that you didn’t respond to what I said – that for the vast majority of her career, Dr Curry has been a supporter of the IPCC and the AGW consensus. It makes all your rabid raving lunacy about obedience to Right wing power simply ludicrous. I suppose if you claim to represent female progressives, at least you admit your own chronic bias. Why not concern yourself with truth or reality rather than creating a fictitious hate-war?
FWIW I don’t have an obeisance to this blogs viewpoint. I write here because there are a number of AGW believers who retain an open-minded, un-partisan, and un-paranoid attitude.
It is one that you most definitely lack.
Martha,
Apologies for the ‘muffin’ quip earlier. You seem hung up on politics which is missing the real point about science, where Judith is spot on.
From a political viewpoint in the US, the climate team know they will be toast if the Republicans win in November, hence the all-out attack on sceptic blogs by Trolls Unlimited. You are batting for the wrong team since they do not give a fig for you, just their own peculiar outlook. Wise up!
Note that Joshua is here demanding Martha’s evidence for the claims she makes about the general public and other scientists.
err not
Tony.
Asking Martha for evidence? that is Joshua’s job. he cares deeply about that and doesnt favor any side when it comes to asking for evidence of wild claims about the public.
Martha –
I appreciate much of what you write in these pages. FWIW – I had a negative reaction to the comment you wrote above. I think that the valid points you are making get lost in the rancor. Of course, I come under attack her often for making comments that I consider less rancorous – so take my input for what it’s worth.
Yes Martha, how do you know Judith’s political views? Personally, I am a liberal, and I certainly don’t see Judith as cyberbullying anyone, particularly not “cyberbullying of the public who are not your denizens”.
“it’s incredible that someone with a PhD responds in a way that makes your use of ideology to mask personal interests and obedience to Right-wing power so completely transparent.”
obedience to Right-wing power? Please fill me in on the details.
billc, I think anyone who seriously believes this: “JC memo to scientists who need legal defense: read my previous post on integrity and responsibility.” (i.e. if you need legal defense it’s because you’re a bad person) is engaging in cyberbullying.
Do you think that Dr Curry’s point of view on this occasion is valid?
Louise, no, I don’t think that is cyberbullying and certainly not “of the public”. Cyberbullying of other scientists (who in this case aren’t “the public” by virtue of being Judith’s peers, more or less) – maybe just a teency bit – not enough to raise my eyebrown. Consulting clients have said worse to me when I was entry level right out of school, working 8 levels below the project manager.
See the lawsuits involving Tim Ball. Do you think he’s entitled to free legal defense?
“Conservatives like Curry”
Yes Martha, you live in an alternate universe.
Obama supporter, consensus member, U of Colorado Boulder, academic. Right, that makes lots of sense.
You’re having a bad day in the deep end are we? This sort of thing plays out among extremist groups all the time, she just isn’t leftist enough for your taste. Joshua goes down this road from time to time as well.
I don’t care that she doesn’t discuss her personal political views, it’s the idea of silence regarding all those in the debate and her peer group who clearly have very strong views of a very similar in kind to you Martha. That AGW belief leads to a support for a radical statist expansion doesn’t appeal to your general world view Martha? You can’t connect these dots Martha?
Martha, thank you for continually reinforcing my belief that AGW defenders know they dont have the science on their side and have become increasingly embittered and strike out at those who do. The petty attacks still dont change the science. I would say these diatribes are beneath you but I am not sure what that would imply.
Martha:
“Perhaps Curry doesn’t say, because Curry doesn’t know. I have to say, such an unself-conscious, excited, flattered tone combined with zero insight about why being personally invited in the absence of information of an established outreach process is in some ways no different from what she says concerns her.
Unfortunately, Curry is in fact not someone many people will take seriously on ethics, integrity or responsibility, anymore.
###########
sorry I read Dr. Curries tone as surprised rather than flattered. I don’t see any textual support for a reading of excited or flattered. If you were a student of mine i would give you an F and suggest that you have read attitudes into the text that are unsupported.
On the issue of the “outreach” process. Your observation would carry more weight if you can establish exactly what power the IAC has in the political process. If they have special access to political power, then I would expect them to have a transparent and open process. If they have any power and refuse your requests to provide the basis of selection, then you have a good case. Otherwise, you really don’t have anything that concerns people like me who actually dedicate time energy and money to open and transparent process. Our first concern is getting transparency in the seats of power. Governments, institutions, folks who have special access to power.
Please don’t pretend to care about transparency and openness when to date you have done nothing on a personal basis to promote it or fight for it.
If, you’d like to fight for it, feel free to write me and I can assign you some FOI to write.
“If you were a student of mine i would give you an F and suggest that you have read attitudes into the text that are unsupported”
I’m not your student. What’s more, I have seen quite a few of your more academic comments and I have more than an average grasp of Derrida, poststructuralism and postmodernism. You overlook the limitations and your thinking is less than provocative, to me.
Re IAC. As you know, it has management, administrative and leadership functions, and some legal and political power to manage international decision-making frameworks. However, I don’t know that it is regarded as having “special” access to political power. Of course, it might depend on what you mean by “special’. Like, ‘magical’, Steven?
“Please don’t pretend to care about transparency and openness when to date you have done nothing on a personal basis to promote it or fight for it”
There are many ways and levels at which people work on issues. I appreciate your consistency, as I have often said; but at the same time, I have little interest in your all-consuming perspective on the transparency issue. I think we have to balance these things, with other concerns. Actually, there have been some consequences of your single-minded focus and your personal actions that have had unintended consequences that go completely against what you are working for. You’re smart, so I’d like to see you challenge yourself with that.
“If, you’d like to fight for it, feel free to write me and I can assign you some FOI to write”
Let’s be clear, you will ‘assign’ me nothing.
What’s more, I see no shared aims or interests. Well, maybe a little crossover, but not much. Take care.
“Re IAC. As you know, it has management, administrative and leadership functions, and some legal and political power to manage international decision-making frameworks.”
Me? Personally. I love nothing more than tearing down such structures, to the base of, a man.
Martha needs an alignment.
what a hoot.
Martha
““If you were a student of mine i would give you an F and suggest that you have read attitudes into the text that are unsupported”
I’m not your student. What’s more, I have seen quite a few of your more academic comments and I have more than an average grasp of Derrida, poststructuralism and postmodernism. You overlook the limitations and your thinking is less than provocative, to me.
##########################################
This has nothing to do with Derrida. This has to do with your inability to support your reading from the text. It’s clear that you are not my student, hence I used the word “IF”. that should have clued you in.
###################
Re IAC. As you know, it has management, administrative and leadership functions, and some legal and political power to manage international decision-making frameworks. However, I don’t know that it is regarded as having “special” access to political power. Of course, it might depend on what you mean by “special’. Like, ‘magical’, Steven?
#############
There should be no secret what special access to political power means. For example, people who work on K street have special access. The IPCC has special access.
“There are many ways and levels at which people work on issues. I appreciate your consistency, as I have often said; but at the same time, I have little interest in your all-consuming perspective on the transparency issue. I think we have to balance these things, with other concerns. Actually, there have been some consequences of your single-minded focus and your personal actions that have had unintended consequences that go completely against what you are working for. You’re smart, so I’d like to see you challenge yourself with that.”
################
It’s nice that you think that “we” have to balance things. You’ve done nothing on any issue whatsoever. Nothing. How about you balance that by actually doing something and testing your ideas in the realm of action. You’re a blow hard. all talk and no action. When you take action, let me know. And inform us what you learned from your action. Talk is easy, the only mistakes you make are grammatical ones.
And you are right. I will assign you nothing. I wouldnt because you cant write or talk your way out of a paper bag, much less do anything constructive.
start here Martha
http://www.interacademycouncil.net/23450/24788/24803.aspx
This post is about integrity of science and the onus put on scientists to never give misleading informatyion to the public.
In my respons to a request for links to information about OLR and CO2 emissions I provided links to data
In response WHT provided this meaningless babble
WebHubTelescope | January 27, 2012 at 2:03 am |
Norm, For a physical system, the integrated incoming and outgoing radiation can be equal at various points in time, yet the emitting temperatures can differ. And that’s what matters. You will be surprised at how trivially this can be demonstrated.
This is a perfect example of the misleading rhetoric that has confused the public into believing that CO2 emissions are causing catastrophic global warming when the physical data demonstrates that this is not happening because it is physically impossible.
Honest science would have ended this global warming scam in 2002 when the Earth started cooling with increased CO2 emissions as it did from 1942 to 1975, but dishonest science has perpetuated the fraud using the type, of rhetoric displayed here that attempts to refute data with silly meaningless arguments!
Norm,
Take a small planet and cover it with black soot. Then alongside it, place a planet covered with shiny foil. Let both go to steady state and measure the radiative energy balance. They will both give zero, even though the temperatures of the two planets are vastly different. One can certainly try to measure differentials on the way to steady-state, but it isn’t as obvious as you would think.
Web, planets are expensive, what say we cover most of the top half of one with black soot or dirt at least and most of the bottom half with something shiny, but less expensive than foil, water maybe. Budgetary restrictions ya know. :)
What would it cost to cover the missing arctic sea ice with foil?
Biilc, come on man! Foil is so twentieth century, We can use biodegradable plastic snow made from bacon fat.
bill c,
The problem with tinfoil for the Arctic is that AGW believers have bought it all up for their caps.
What does this have to do with misrepresenting facts to the public stating that CO2 emissions from fossil fuels are causing global warming when all evidence shows that there has been no global warming since 1998 as CO2 emissions from fossil fuels continue to increase at unprecedented rates.
People are starving to death because their food is being used as feedstock for biofuel production because of this fraudulent idiocy and the best you can do is play God and cover planets with shiny foil as an argument in support of this lunacy?
Limit cases for evaluating what extremes are encountered. We do this as a thought experiment.
Yeah, what a pitiful analogy. Lysenko only bolluxed up biology in the USSR, at relatively little social cost. Jones, Mann et all have bolluxed up climate science worldwide at huge social cost.
==================
Not to mention “sucking the oxygen” from many other fields’ funding and influence. It’s worse than The Blob. (Ironically — guess what stopped The Blob!
“Steve remembers that the Blob retreated from the refrigerator, too, and tells Lt. Dave that the Blob apparently cannot stand the cold (“CO2, Dave, CO2!”)”
“It is telling that you didn’t respond to what I said – that for the vast majority of her career, Dr Curry has been a supporter of the IPCC and the AGW consensus” Anteros
Anteros,
You simply did not see that I did respond. I said, ‘ I’m aware of ‘the history of the conversation’. Apparently, it flew right over your head, along with any possible nuances.
Yes, I discuss my own and others’ political beliefs and ideological underpinnings, very openly. I find it’s the only way to be realistic. It’s not my responsibility to teach you how to identify the political framework within which you locate social issues. That is your responsibility. However, if you think there is a whole world out there that does not know how to examine the political elements of your comments, and the posts on this blog, you are completely wrong. So you might want to figure it out, because anything else is hypocritical and contradictory.
take care
Martha –
I will indeed endeavour to take care.
I think you may have a bit of poitical fanaticism going on. Can I remind you that this is a climate blog?
I’d be fascinated to hear of your examination of my comments. But just in case you get it hopelessly wrong like you did with Dr Curry, you should note that I have never thought, behaved, funded or voted for anything conservative. Start from there.
How non-coincidence Anteros, I have always voted Conservative (being UK based as are you).
Politics doesn’t have a role in the climate debate in UK IMO. The US obsession with it is quite fascinating in a very strange way.
Louise –
I haven’t still got my head round that about the US. I get the feeling like as scary proportion of people haven’t the faintest interest in climate. It’s like they were in the middle of a fight in one pub [say, one called “the right to bear arms”, or “health care for all”] and wandered into another pub [“climate futures”] without noticing the change of environment, but carrying on fighting.
Are we as a rule less political in general?
Anteros, I’ll give you the gas pedal to my SUV when you take it out of my cold, dead toes.
Anteros, I don’t think our politicians need to distance themselves from the opposition to the same extremes that the US does. Subtle nuances are welcomed. Very few folk are rabidly right wing or rabidly left wing (they leave those tribal allegiances to football). I think in general everyone wants a NHS, everyone wants those unable to support themselves to have a saftey net and that the better off should provide this. In the UK it’s a case of degree.
Without diverting this post too far off course, the specifics within the UK are about how much (tax, benefits, defence, overseas aid, etc) rather than abolutes (should we have them or not).
(Getting slightly back on topic) most folk agree that reducing the use of fossil fuels has benefits (reduced CO2, reduced dependency on Russian gas, etc) but I think in general most folk accept the concensus view that emitting unlimited CO2 for ever into the future will have bad consequences for the global climate. That acceptance has nothing to do with party politics (unless we include those rabid ones I excluded earlier – GWPF, Greenpeace, etc).
“Can I remind you that this is a climate blog?”
Anteros, if you read, it will become obvious to you that the majority of posts and threads are not discussions of the current or technical science — if that’s what you mean. Most people do not get their climate science, here. What’s more, the ‘Etc’ part is often the compulsive posting of denizens who repetitively express conservative or libertarian views on the economy and cannot demonstrate scientific literacy to save themselves; but you seem to need to ignore this, and instead focus on me, today. O.K. I comment relatively infrequently, usually on theoretical, ethical or methodological issues or on practical issues like maternal health or the North; and I am scientifically literate and comfortable discussing substantive research issues.
So… for me to spend any more time speaking with you today, you would have to make more intelligent comments than you have chosen to make, so far.
I think we’re done, my brother. :-)
Martha –
I think you need to enlarge that descriptor a bit. At least to account for my participation, if not others.
Sorry Martha, I havent seen you even come close to discussing the underpinnings of your own beliefs in a way that comes close to be adequate or commensurate with the attention you give to others.
Go ahead…
Then I have to wonder if you read or have tried to understand what you read.
I have said that I approach the issues from a feminist perspective. I often discuss issues from a conflict theory of society, evidenced not only by my discussion of institutions and ideology but also by my comfort with discussing real conflicts of values. I spend quite a bit of time on gender analysis/gender effects (hard to miss). I have stated that my central political values include equality, participatory democracy and care for others. I have frequently argued that the state has a positive role to play in society but not without public demand. I hold what I have said can be viewed as a humanitarian approach in relation to responsibility for mitigation and damages in relation to climate change. I also see an important role for working outside the system.
I have made it clear that I support climate policy that aggressively pursues efficiency and mitigation and adaptation in developed economies with appropriate progression of responsiblity-taking in developing economies, plus renewables in geographically and economically suitable areas, plus new technologies. I think we have to reduce consumption, manage carbon using a regulatory approach, and reduce emissions. I support(ed) Kyoto. I have argued on this site that we may need to stay open to nuclear, at least transitionally. I have to have a rational response to the science and to economic analysis, as evidenced by my familiarity and ability to discuss many lines of argument.
So my discussion of the beliefs and values I hold and how these are related to the positions I take, here at ClimateEtc., seems perhaps more than “adequate and commensurate with the attention I give to others’ [beliefs]”, Steven. :-)
Martha, honestly I don’t see why you come here. For someone who claims Judith is ‘increasingly isolated and not considered objective by other researchers or the public’ I don’t see why you waste your precious time reading her posts. Further, it’s beyond me to understand why you waste your time reading the ‘conservative’ and ‘libertarian’ POV’s in the threads as well. I mean really… are you that hard up for something to do? I mean, I could understand you trying to understand how others think outside your head, but you don’t really come across that way… you know…. your really come off a little.. well…. snooty. Kinda like a ‘know-it-all’ instead of someone ready to debate an issue like adults do. Teen age girls, yeah… they argue like you do, they don’t argue the topic at hand rather they resort to using put downs and condescending remarks… it’s a bit catty, but you expect that from teens, I should know… I live with several. Maybe I’m going out on a limb here… but I am guessing your past your teen years. If so, then you should be mature enough to learn how to converse about an opposing view point without making it a personal attack on your opponent (in general that tactic is not too successful as it makes the attacking debater look like they are trying to change the subject to something they are more comfortable with rather than the subject they are not conversant in). Now, I’m not saying your uneducated in the topic at hand…. it just appears that way from what you wrote. So maybe in order to regain some credibility in the future, try responding to the topic of the thread instead of attacking Judith the next time you visit.
“However, if you think there is a whole world out there that does not know how to examine the political elements of your comments, and the posts on this blog, you are completely wrong. So you might want to figure it out, because anything else is hypocritical and contradictory. ”
Do the terms “pompus, arrogant and self-rightous” come to mind Martha? You call that an argument?
Anteros
Not living in either the UK or USA, my observations may have missed something, but I believe the problem in the UK is that the general public is suffering from “climate disaster fatigue”. This has resulted from the excessive barrage of CAGW propaganda its government has been force-feeding it over the state-run media and through government-sponsored TV ad campaigns. Chasing costly windmills and the return of snow have not helped the cause as the average voter is baffled by a government that’s “gone bonkers”.
http://www.repealtheact.org.uk/climate-change-act/latest-uk-public-opinion-polls-on-global-warming-green-energy-policy
In the USA the public is more concerned about gasoline prices – hence energy security – and the economy than about hypothetical greenhouse warming postulated for the distant future. The average American is exposed to a constant flow of propaganda (from all sides) but has learned to take this with a grain of salt, preferring exposés of dubious claims to PR campaigns. As a result, the recent revelations of falsification by the IPCC specifically and the climate scientists in general has shifted the public’s opinion dramatically.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/environment_energy/69_say_it_s_likely_scientists_have_falsified_global_warming_research
Switzerland, where I live, is too small to count. It is greatly influenced by its larger neighbors, especially Germany, and to a smaller extent, France. Politicians have maintained the “PC” position that humans are causing global warming by their CO2 emissions and this could lead to future problems, but the post-Fukushima fear of nuclear power is even greater. Most of the electrical power comes from hydroelectric plants with the balance essentially all from nuclear generation, which will be phased out by recent executive mandate some undetermined date in the future – once an alternate is found. Switzerland has no natural gas. Wind is not very effective here and people object to the unsightly turbines spoiling the postcard landscapes. Solar works for domestic use locally but there are not that many hours of sunshine. So the viable alternates do not yet exist.
These local snapshots, plus the failures at Copenhagen, Cancun and Durban at the macro level, lead me to believe that the fear of CAGW is losing its public appeal pretty much everywhere on the globe.
What say you?
Max
manacker – do you really believe that “exposés of dubious claims” are not actually PR campaigns from the opposing camp?
Max –
I certainly believe there is a great deal of ‘fatigue’ at play. Sustaining public interest in an alleged future-problem [however catastrophic it can be made to appear] is almost hopeless. A decade of no warming and no disasters have added to that.
I actually agree with John Houghton’s statement [pre-misuse] that the only thing that’ll motivate big – I mean really big, not our stupid ugly windmills – policy changes is a big climate catastrophe. The bad news of course is that they happen anyway, but a mega-disaster [drought, flood, hurricane] will be ‘global warminged’ and knee-jerk reactions may well ensue.
I agree different countries have different sensibilities, and priorities.
I think the failures at Copenhagen and Durban are indicative of something certainly – isn’t it a pity that once set up, a body like the iPCC is pretty much self-perpetuating?
The coal mountain calling the nearby dusted snow “black”!!
Fenton is a big segment of said mountain, and, e.g., owns and operates Real Climate. Greenpeace International is a corporation dedicating hundreds of millions to promoting Warmism. Etc., etc.
There isn’t a scintilla of evidence of any organized “PR campaigns from the opposing camp.” Pure rhetoric and dissimulation. Your usual output.
The MSM has much to answer for. The only lesson of Fukushima is “Fear Really Big Tsunamis!”
Believe me, if a tsunami reaches Switzerland, nuclear damage is the least of the worries you’ll have. :D
manacker,
You are just outling the truth- something that the AGW believers have worked very hard to avoid.
“Martha, try responding to content of what I write” Judy
I did, but I guess you don’t see it.
“judgment about my “behavior” without any supporting arguments and then claim that your opinions represent “other researchers and the public.”Judy
I said many people don’t take you seriously, and I think you are increasingly isolated and increasingly not considered objective by other researchers or the public. There is no need to take my word for it, however: simply read something other than your own blog.
“my tolerance and fairness in allowing such posts here” Judy
Dorothy? Are we still in Kansas? :-(
“I don’t talk about my personal politics on the blog”Judy
That is both contradictory and hypocritical, given your stated goals and the political elements of many posts and your expressed opinions.
“it is a matter of public record that I contributed fairly substantially to Barack Obama’s presidential campaign”
Who cares?
“trying to explain my behavior as some sort of right wing motivation is really pointless” Judy
What I said is that you often uncritically recycle crap from front groups and think tanks and other sources of blatant disinformation and bad science; and that you have yet to make a coherent ethical argument based in the science for policy options you (now) reject e.g. emissions reductions. I suggested this kind of flies in the face of an objective position on ethical practice, when you either refuse to discuss the biases underlying the content and positions taken in your posts, on your climate science blogs; or worse, have no sense of these biases.
But I do have to say I regret the Gong Show comment because apparently some of the men thought I was saying something that I had no idea I was saying. Turns out they don’t watch the Gong Show but they do read pornography. My apologies. :-(
Martha,
I think the post of yours this is in reply to belongs in the archive of disturbed, circular, gibherish.
You are breaking into new frontiers and helping enlarge the skeptical ranks with each and every post.
Keep up the good work.
Aaah, yes…..the conservative-old-white-men-of-the-blog-who-just-don’t-get-it-and-don’t-watch-the-gong-show-but-do-read-porn “problem”! You’re zeroin’ in on us, Martha. Love it!
Wow –
Did Martha’s prejudice lead her to think I was white, conservative and old?
It’s some seriously weird prisms she’s peerin’ thru.
I bet she thinks I’m a mammalian biped too.
Ha ha ha :)
Seriously, I didn’t know that ‘gonged’ meant something else. :-(
Terribly unfortunate.
Seems to be a younger demographic’s word. Who knew? I’m old. :-)
cheers
Martha,
It is great for you to send in a postcard from your alternate universe.
It sounds like nothing much has changed: What you say has nearly nothing to do with this universe.
Keep in touch,
hunter
with regards to teaching critical thinking, a relevant cartoon showed up on my facebook page, a student taking a multiple choice test:
Q: Name three types of rock
A: Classic, dumb, hard
Nice example of the problems with using standardized tests for much of anything, let alone the quality of students’ thinking.
That’s not a multiple choice test; that’s essay free-form. In multiple choice the choices are pre-listed by the examiner.
I’m afraid that’s a FAIL (somebody’s).
I just added a little bit of salt more, it was excellent.
Gracias por dejarnos opinar y dejar nuestras comentarios en este espacio, he leido el articulo mediante el traductor y me ha parecido excelente. Muy buenas imagenes y contenido. Por favor, visita nuestra web de Floreria referente a flores y plantas . Thanks and sorry for no post in your language!
Openess has been an issue for quite some time. This is from a paper published in 1999. However, note this: (Received 1 July 1996; in revised form 4 February 1999). Written in 1995 or early 1996, probably.
Simon Shackley, James Risbey, Peter Stone And Brian Wynne, ADJUSTING TO POLICY EXPECTATIONS IN CLIMATE CHANGE MODELING: An Interdisciplinary Study of Flux Adjustments in Coupled Atmosphere-Ocean General Circulation Models, Climatic Change, Vol. 43, pp. 413–454, 1999.
From the Abstract:
And this in Footnote 53
Interesting find. Shackley wrote several very insightful papers in the late 1990’s
Yes they did. Here’s an interesting exchange about some of your favorite subjects, uncertainty and complexity and good science, within the modeling framework. These probably fit better in other posts / threads.
Simon Shackley, Peter Young, Stuart Parkinson And Brian Wynne, UNCERTAINTY, COMPLEXITY AND CONCEPTS OF GOOD SCIENCE IN CLIMATE CHANGE MODELLING: ARE GCMs THE BEST TOOLS?, Climatic Change Vol. 38, pp. 159–205, 1998.
A discussion by Henderon-Sellers and McGuffie:
Correspondence
A. Henderson-Sellers And K. Mcguffie, CONCEPTS OF GOOD SCIENCE IN CLIMATE CHANGE MODELLING Comments on S. Shackley et al., Climatic Change 38, 1998,
Climatic Change Vol. 42, pp. 597–610, 1999.
And response by the authors:
Simon Shackley, Peter Young And Stuart Parkinson, RESPONSE TO A. HENDERSON-SELLERS AND K. McGUFFIE,
Climatic Change, Vol. 42, pp. 611–617, 1999.
I referenced the “are GCMs the best tools” paper in my presentation on What can we learn from climate models? these papers may deserve their own thread, these issues are still very timely and Shackley’s papers are very insightful
Yo Mama has transistor in sister.
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Ugh, bot guts and streams of glowing electrons. I’ll tidy up, Judy.
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This great post is approved by TasteMySeoJuice
I like this web site so much, saved to bookmarks. “Respect for the fragility and importance of an individual life is still the mark of an educated man.” by Norman Cousins.
There is obviously a lot to know about this. I think you made some good points and Features also.
Thanks for the information, I will be sure to check back for future updates
Nice example of the problems with using standardized tests for much of anything, let alone the quality of students’ thinking.
Obok calej gamy pokryc konwencjonalnych oferujemy równiez uslugi, które sa rzadko spotykane na rynku. Przykladem takich technologii jest: