…to respond to this post.
There are still some of you around, not just Messrs. Idso, Hughes, Lindzen and the well-known, but also those of you with whom I have debated, argued and discussed the subject of climate change over the past several months. Please will you browse through these pages.
This is the result of a search on Google scholar, using the advanced search tool, specifying the exact phrase “global climate change”, between 1998-2007, and filtering the results further by including only the four categories starting; ‘Biology…’, ‘Chemistry…’, ‘Engineering…’ and ‘Physics…’. The procedure has returned 15,300 results.
[This search method was inspired by recent discussions of the as-yet unpublished paper by Schulte, and observations and comments on the website ‘Rabett Run‘]
My question is simple: after browsing through a few pages of the results, or selecting a number of the papers, what reasonable inferences can be made about the issue of ‘global climate change’?
That it is a much-discussed subject in the literature of many academic disciplines is a given. That many of the papers do not question the ‘consensus’ scientific view of climate change is also a given. But what does this body of evidence, from many scientific disciplines, suggest to you, a rational, intelligent person, about the scientific and rational status of climate science?
You may argue that, in failing to question the assumption of anthropogenic global warming, these scientists, mostly outside the academic discipline of climate science, are relying on the conclusions of the vast majority of climate scientists, which are ipso facto incorrect. This would mean that each and all of these papers relies on at least one false assumption. This, in turn, would imply that all of this science, all of the processes involved in preparing research, making observations, analysing results, and peer-reviewing the finished papers, was intrinsically flawed.
If you make this contention, you are effectively challenging the intelligence and rationality of what could arguably amount to the entirety of the scientific process, and all of the people who engage in it and with it. Thus, you are pitting your own rationality against that of large bodies of scientists, and inferring that they have overlooked, or misunderstood something which only you and a few others have understood correctly.
I would contend that any rational, intelligent person who took a little time to read even the very briefest summaries of a representative proportion of these 15,300 papers, will come to some fairly straightforward conclusions.
Firstly, that there is a vast body of evidence through all disciplines that global climate change is a matter of importance which is seriously addressed by each of these disciplines.
Secondly, that the vast majority of this research points towards impacts of global climate change which are negative, destructive, undesirable or, under certain circumstances, even alarming in their implications.
Thirdly, that the global warming which is consistently established as a causal agent in these impacts is potentially dangerous, either to specific or general objects, and that this inference is made time and time again on the basis of existing observation and due diligence in methodology.
And then there is the final, impressionistic response to the sheer immensity of this body of evidence, which, we should remember, is only a small proportion of what may be available on the subject. The overriding impression is one of concern, of negative consequences, of recognised and real risks to enough phenomena to count as the entire ecosystem.
So I am asking you, as rational, intelligent people, to explain to me where I have gone wrong. What error of reasoning have I, and by implication, all of these scientists, been guilty of? Why you feel that, in the face of this evidence, which is contradictory to your skepticism, you have grounds to challenge the claims of those who tell us that global climate change is real, that it entails risks which are potentially dangerous to us and our world, and that action to ameliorate these risks is both desirable and necessary?
So once again I ask you; please respond to this post…
Respectfully,
Old man in a cave 
14 comments
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September 16, 2007 at 11:42 pm
Jayred
Hi Fergus. Thanks for the appeal. As a non-scientists, I was looking for evidence for the existing consensus among climatologists. That’s how we first met at the Deltoid blog, remember. “Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind.” This time I got the Einstein quote right. Even the most atheistic scientist builds his science on faith. Climate scientists now take for granted climate change by human activities just as much as they take for granted evolution of the species (Oreskes 2007). Human induced global warming is called a fact because there is no evidence to prove otherwise that passes the peer test. There are different kinds of truths. May I share with you a truth that does not pass the peer test but is just as true: The foolishness of the cross
http://www.albertmohler.com/commentary_read.php?cdate=2006-04-24
September 17, 2007 at 12:20 am
fergusbrown
Hi Jayred, and thanks for visiting the cave. I am perplexed by your comment. Surely, Einstein’s quote is a reflection of his personal view on religion, rather than a suggestion that science cannot be done without religion.
I understand what you mean about faith, I think, but the difference between a scientist and a believer is that a scientist, if he discovers that the object of his faith is false, is able to leave it and find a new ‘hypothesis; this luxury is not possible to the ‘man of faith’, who must persist with it, especially when it is tested most severely.
There is a difference between faith and science which is irrevocable, which is the use of reason. Without it, science is nothing, whereas faith is resistant to it. If one applies rational standards or values to a question or situation, as you must when doing science, then only rational answers will suffice. If one applies the standards set out by one or other faith (which normally but not necessarily carries with it a belief system), then not only is your truth no longer universal (as other faiths have their, different answers), but also it no longer needs to be validated except within its own rule-system.
This does not mean a person cannot be a scientist with a faith, like Einstein, or a believer who is rational, as many people undoubtedly are; it does mean, though, that when one is evaluating the truth or otherwise of a statement, one must take into account the value-system which is in operation. As an interesting side-note, Jurgen Habermas has recently turned this idea on its head, I am told, by announcing that all of Western thought in the modern era leads back inexorably to Christianity, which I don’t understand, but do find an interesting challenge.
I get the impression that your link involves your intention to evangelise your own personal faith in public. I will let it pass this time, but will not allow my blog to be used for other people’s ‘advertising’; please do not do it again. feel free, however, to express your own thoughts and opinions; that is what the blog is for.
I am aware that, in promoting the scientific perspective, one is in danger of assuming the superiority of ‘techne’ over other modes of thought, and that not everything in our experience is as amenable to reason or the scientific process as it could be. However, if we are to talk about science, in this case climate science, we should apply the principles of scientific enquiry to the objects of our discussion.
Please understand that I am not a person who has decided to be ‘anti-faith’, but I am a person who knows he is incapable of it, which is different. I cannot commit Kierkegaard’s ‘leap of faith’; that may make me a lesser person in your eyes, but that it how it is.
Finally, there is an implication (but no more than that) in your post, that somehow you feel that the idea of AGW is in conflict with your Christian beliefs. I would be interested to know how that particular piece of reasoning goes.
Regards,
September 17, 2007 at 5:14 pm
Timo Hämeranta
Fergus, you ask critical or sceptical comments on ‘the claims of those who tell us that global climate change is real, that it entails risks which are potentially dangerous to us and our world, and that action to ameliorate these risks is both desirable and necessary?’
Well, having studied most of the papers you refer to I’ll respond as follows:
1) so far, we have no all-inclusive Theory of Climate,
2) we only have various estimations on various, but not all phenomena, causes and interactions influencing climate, or rather the Earth System,
3) scientifically nobody knows what Future brings
4) all potential risks are not probable ones,
5) risk amelioration is desirable when based on cost/benefit analysis and political prioritizing.
About items 4-5 please see e.g.
Seo, S. Niggol, 2007. Is Stern Review on climate change alarmist? Energy & Environment Vol. 18, No 5, pp. 521-532, September 2007
“The main conclusion of this paper is that only under the alarmist approach—which assumes both the most severe climate change and the most extreme estimate of climate change damage to the economy—we can be convinced that the cost of climate change is close to 20% of the global GDP in 2100. In most other cases, the cost will be under 1% of the global GDP.”
It remains to be seen whether scientific prudence or prevailing public alarmism will win in political decision making.
September 17, 2007 at 5:54 pm
fergusbrown
Helloe, Timo, and welcome to the cave; your name is known to me from the various climate websites, and I appreciate your visit.
1) is true. It could be argued, though, that a unified ‘big picture’ of climate does, however, exist, though it is missing in some details; whether this is what you mean by a ‘theory of climate’ I am not sure. The other question I have on this is, do we need a comprehensive theory of climate in order to make rational decisions? This boils down to the question of whether we already know enough to make a decision, or not. I accept that any decision based on imperfect knowledge is also a risk, as the chance exists that it may be the wrong decision, but this risk can be weighed against the risks associated with inaction.
2) is perhaps a little cynical in its phrasing, but is, broadly right, but again, this boils down to the same point as number 1.
3) this is trivially true, of course, but here the question might be what we choose to allow as ‘knowledge’, or again ‘sufficient knowledge’ in this case. It is important to remind other readers here that no claims of certain foreknowledge are being made, and neither are they required to determine what inductive reasoning, at the least, can direct our reason to infer about the likely future.
4) You will have to explain, as it appears a trivial truth here and no more. Again, though, does this not boil down to the reliability of our estimates and reasoning, as with the previous points?
5) Has a simple response; according to whom? This is a large assumption to make and not necessarily justifiable outside a purely economic view. And as for political prioritising; surely this is one of the key objects under discussion; what should political priorities be? I’d also add that the dichotomy of scientific prudence and public alarmism is a false one, since it is the scientists who are leading the way, by and large, in insisting that the issue of global climate change should be addressed now. These are the ‘those who tell us’ of the sentence you quote, not the media or the public, but prudent scientists.
As with other rational people I have discussed this matter with, we seem to have one central question about climate science and the future, which is ‘do we know enough to determine that action is necessary?’ and a different socio-political question, which is ‘what criteria should we use to assess the risks associated with climate change, and the worth of the objects which will feel the impact?’ We might also seek to make more sense of the idea of costs and benefits by comparing the total social benefit of present use of resources against the future social cost of the absence of resources. Wheat is worth less than oil when you use markets as a measure. When you are hungry, it is worth far more.
I hope my response stimulates you to offer a reply,
Respectfully,
September 18, 2007 at 8:45 am
Jayred
Fergus, I was logged in as Jayred when first commenting but I think you may remeber me. Thank you very much for your valuable insights. I do respect these bounderies now. To answer your final question, AGW as a result of “human activities” (IPCC 2007) are by no means in contradiction with my christian faith. May I borrow the words of Timo here: If “scientific prudence wins” against ” public alarmism”, I believe we are on the right track.
Regards,
September 18, 2007 at 10:46 am
fergusbrown
Aha! Now it all becomes clearer; thank you, Markus.
I would ask both of you to clarify what you understand by the terms ‘scientific prudence’ and ‘public alarmism’.
If by these terms you mean to propose that reasoned discussion is preferable to sensationalist ‘reporting’, then we will all be in agreement.
However, Timo, your usage seems to suggest that your emphasis is more on the ‘prudence’ than the ‘science’, and that this ‘prudence’ is something to be measured economically. I think I am coming to the conclusion that, for the purposes of assessing climate impacts, cost-benefit analysis is useless; it simply cannot capture the complexities of either the systems involved or the issues.
Jayred/Markus; I am not sure what your usage means. Assuming that none of us believes that media-spun apocalyptic catastrophism is a constructive approach, would you count, for example, a statement by a leading scientist in the UK Met Office that ‘avoiding a 2C rise in temperatures now looks almost impossible, and 3C very unlikely’ and that ‘millions or tens of millions of people are very likely to be affected by drought and famine by mid-century’ (These are paraphrases) as ‘alarmist’? They may be alarming, but do they exaggerate the risks? (which is what I understand ‘alarmist’ to mean).
Hoping for a response…
September 18, 2007 at 1:46 pm
Markus
Fergus, I do not know the context of these paraphrases, just that they come from the very prestigeous Met Office Hadley Centre. It is partly funded by Defra (I used the link in your sidebar). So I gather that you are not talking about the statement of the chief meteorologist. I don’t want to judge anything but a strong political arm is evident in this interdisciplinarian institution. It has reached a political power comparable with GISS NASA. Bottom line, yes, I would call a public statement coming from a chief scientist (or even THE chief scientist) of this body the statement of an alarmist. In my humble opinion, if it is a meteorologist, he or she should lose the job for a public statement like this.
September 18, 2007 at 2:03 pm
fergusbrown
So, Markus, you are saying that this is a politically-inspired statement, rather than a scientifically-inspired one. Why would you believe this? Though the Met. Office is funded from central government, none of it’s appointees are political, in the way that some appointees to official posts are in the USA.
To suggest that the Met Office has political power is simply false. It has influence, because its expertise is recognised and valued, but it has no ‘power’ at all.
Your claim that this is an ‘alarmist’ statement means that you think it is an exaggeration. But it is in line with the expectations of future probable climate as laid out in all the major institutions, so in what sense can it be called an exaggeration, if it is a broadly accurate expression of the view of most scientific academies? You can only think it is ‘alarmist’ because you think it, and all the other authorities, are either incidentally or deliberately wrong in their statements.
To claim deliberate exaggeration on political grounds is to suggest that all of the scientists involved are effectively lackeys of a number of governments which wish to deceive the general public. This is foolish; all you are doing is resorting to the old-fashioned claims of some kind of ‘conspiracy’, a claim which is only worthy of ridicule.
If, on the other hand, you are claiming that the exaggeration of these eminent scientists is based on a misunderstanding or misinterpretation of the science, you must provide evidence which substantiates this claim, and show where they have made this error.
Needles to say, I don’t expect to see any resignations, but perhaps you can explain on what grounds such a resignation might be expected?
Regards,
September 19, 2007 at 10:32 am
Markus
Fergus, this is not to be a rebuke against a particular academic branch or any other trade. By no means. It is again a question of the value system. I am convinced, that human nature tends to seek recognition of whatever sort (money, popularity, status, rank, political power, love,…). It can seduce us to take shortcuts to achieve that goal. I am an advocate of the separation of powers. This is also substantial for prudent scientific work, in the business world (law, accounting, audit). In statistics (source, diffusion, interpretation without agenda). Needless to name the three political powers. I collect data. If a journalist calls, someone who has a sensationalist agenda and asks for my personal interpretaion of the results with impacts to one particular industry which is not in line with the law on independant government statistics, I may lose my job. If a meteorologist makes public statements in the name of climate research, regarding future impacts on people in Sudan (just to give you an example), then he has definitely crossed the line. But if it is the boss of the whole institution, well that’s another story. Bottomline: Check and balance is necessary.
September 19, 2007 at 11:43 am
fergusbrown
Markus; I believe your last two comments refer to the other post, on alarmism, rather than in here; I will respond there and hope you see the message…
September 19, 2007 at 3:37 pm
Dano
1) so far, we have no all-inclusive Theory of Climate,
2) we only have various estimations on various, but not all phenomena, causes and interactions influencing climate, or rather the Earth System,
3) scientifically nobody knows what Future brings
4) all potential risks are not probable ones,
5) risk amelioration is desirable when based on cost/benefit analysis and political prioritizing.
About items 4-5 please see e.g.
Seo, S. Niggol, 2007. Is Stern Review on climate change alarmist? Energy & Environment Vol. 18, No 5, pp. 521-532, September 2007
If I may,
Someone is confusing ‘rationality’ with ‘rationalization’.
Best,
D
September 20, 2007 at 5:25 pm
Timo Hämeranta
Fergus,
without going to details I’ll repeat that
1) strictly scientifically we know nothing about future, and
2) everything man will do to ‘avert man-made climate catastrophe’ is based on precaution only.
I have nothing against precaution, but I call it precaution, and not a proven scientific fact or knowledge.
btw, about climate forecasting please see
Green, Kesten C., and J. Scott Armstrong, 2007. Global Warming: Forecasts by Scientists versus Scientific Forecasts. Forthcoming in Energy & Environment, draft September 8, 2007, online
“…We audited the forecasting processes described in Chapter 8 of the IPCC’s WG1 Report to assess the extent to which they complied with forecasting principles. We found enough information to make judgments on 89 out of a total of 140 forecasting principles. The forecasting procedures that were described violated 72 principles. Many of the violations were, by themselves, critical.
The forecasts in the Report were not the outcome of scientific procedures. In effect, they were the opinions of scientists transformed by mathematics and obscured by complex writing. …”
Well, I have always emphasized that the IPCC papers are normal overviews only and subject to normal scientific scrutiny.
September 20, 2007 at 6:00 pm
fergusbrown
Timo,
Thank you for coming back. In response to your most recent comments:
1) So what? Hans Jonas uses the term ‘scientific futurology’ to describe what he considered to be an essential tool for proper ethical policy decisions in the technological society: that is, an effort to understand as much about how our present decisions will effect our and others’ futures, using as much science as is available. This is more or less what we are trying to do. To object that the future is unknowable is meaningless. We are already very skilled as human beings at anticipating what the future will bring, and when our anticipation is based on careful observation and sound reasoning, we succeed extremely well. As I have said elsewhere, it is as much about the uncertainties as the likelihoods that scientists consider our futures to be at risk. And, as Eli has said, it’s the only sphere of engagement with science where the scientists are more concerned about the future than the public.
2) You may object to the precautionary principle if you wish, but you will have to offer alternative strategies. It is also arguable that enough damage has already been done to make this line of argument no longer relevant; we can see the evidence with our own eyes, and we have no reason to believe that the warming of recent years is going to end; all the evidence is to the contrary.
And you are presenting yet another unpublished draft to ‘Energy and Environment’ as support for your argument. Are you kidding? After the mauling the last effort got (Schulte), don’t you think the credibility of that rag is gone, once and for all? If you are going to offer a criticism of any climate forecasts, projections or predictions (yes, they are different), please provide one from a serious source. They do exist; this isn’t one of them.
Why do you feel that you cannot trust the work of so many scientists? Do you believe that they are wrong, or that they are lying?
Regards,
November 3, 2007 at 8:14 pm
SecularAnimist
Fergus Brown wrote: “There is a difference between faith and science which is irrevocable, which is the use of reason. Without it, science is nothing, whereas faith is resistant to it.”
With all due respect, I disagree. The difference between “faith” and “science” is not “reason” — whatever “reason” means; and outside of formal logic, which has no concrete content, “reason” is rather ill-defined.
The difference between “faith” and “science” is empiricism — a deep and powerful commitment to the idea that the ultimate arbiter of truth is actual observation of what actually is.
At one time in human history, highly intelligent and educated people “reasoned” about how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. Science would have had a very straightforward answer to this question: count them.
“Faith” and “reason” (and “intuition” and more) are various forms of mental activity which can give rise to ideas or notions about “how things are”. What differentiates science from other ways of knowing the world is that science insists that such notions must (1) have consequences that can actually be observed if the notion is true, and will not be observed if the notion is false — ie. the notion must make falsifiable predictions about the result of observations — and (2) actual observations must be made to determine whether the predictions of the notion are correct. To the extent that an idea or notion makes falsifiable predictions of the results of observation, and actual observations show those predictions to be correct, that notion is regarded as “scientifically true.”
It is not “reason” that defines science as a privileged way of knowing the world, it is science’s epistemological foundation in empiricism.