In the children’s game of “telephone” a group of children sit in a circle and someone starts the game by whispering a phrase to the person seated neat to them and so on all around the circle. After enough transmissions a phrase that begins as “five stories” might come out the end as “jive turkey” to everyone’s delight. The game of telephone provides a cautionary tale for producers and users of scientific assessments. The case of mistaken and misinterpreted information about storm surge impacts illustrates the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggests that the IPCC may have its own “jive turkey” problem minus the delight. . .
The IPCC has great potential to inform policy makers, however its credibility rest on being accurate and faithful to the literature. Errors will inevitably occur, but in this case an error in the IPCC’s most important summaries has been used uncritically in policy documents and academic studies, apparently not having been noticed until now. This problem may be more systemic, e.g., I have elsewhere written about the IPCC’s erroneous treatment of non-peer reviewed studies of the attribution of climate disasters to greenhouse gases (e.g., Pielke, 2005). However broad the problem is, as the IPCC gears up for its fourth assessment report it seems critical to carefully evaluate its procedures for accuracy, and for users of the IPCC to understand the strengths and limits of assessments. There is a more fundamental problem and that is the distilling of complex, nuanced research into one-sentence sound bites that perhaps inevitably cannot accurately capture what is to be found in a lengthy scientific article.
23 comments:
Spot on Roger. The thing that leaps out at me on the global warming fiasco is the complete lack of any Quality Assurance especially with the temperature measurements which are the basis for any of their wild projections. Does the IPCC have a Quality Manual which is basic to any technical organisation? Maybe some one could answer.
Since your 2006 prediction that the credibility of the IPCC would rest on their faithful use of the literature they seem to have decided that an inaccurate biased summary would serve their purpose better. And it worked.
The Massachusetts v. EPA decision of 2007 ruling required that there be an injured party and the first injury mentioned was the “…global retreat of mountain glaciers…”. Later in the injury passage there was an observation that “…rising ocean temperatures may contribute to the ferocity of hurricanes.” Both of these IPCC conclusions that the majority opinion was based on have been proven wrong. The hurricane predictions are disproven by a full reading of your own referenced work.
The science was not argued to the Supreme Court. The case was based on an appeal to authority argument where the IPCC was the authority. The credibility of the IPCC did not rest on accuracy; it fell under the weight of their bias.
The majority decision is available at:
http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/06pdf/05-1120.pdf
You know, maybe the problem is that they are trying to do the impossible- that is, summarize the findings of scientists who don't agree with each other. It's hard to design a summary of "A" and "not A." Maybe the IPCC is trying to be too comprehensive.
Perhaps another strategy would be to gather a broad group of scientists and tease out the topics in climate science on which there is broad, peer-reviewed agreement. They would then post those findings on internet for peer and public comment, discussion and review.
This could be done annually so that "what is known" would be a moving target, and government or other policy makers could use the most current agreements in their deliberations.
Which journals rejected your paper.
What reasons were given for the rejection?
Rejected? By who? The IPCC or some other publication?
Why didn't the IPCC accept your work?
Your blog writing is the same writing that you sent to get published?
Not clear here.....
Maurice Garoutte-
Spot on.
Sharon F.-
The IPCC was trying to maintain the fig leaf of consensus.
Sharon F,
You have to keep up...Africagate is bound to blow the whole IPCC report apart. All those starving people the IPCC predicted...no scientific evidence, no peer review study.
If there aren't any 'detrimental effects' to Global Warming...why care? I'd personally enjoy an extra 5 degrees temperature rise.
Maurice,
"rising ocean temperatures MAY contribute to the ferocity of hurricanes"
As I'm sure Roger would agree, this is a conservative statement, as most climate scientists would agree that the strength of hurricanes WILL increase in a warmer world. Roger is correct in pointing out that this increase is NOT YET evident in the damage record, but that's not the same as disproving the theoretical/physical underpinnings of the prediction....
Roger,
I think I'm beginning to appreciate your irritation with the IPCC. But let's be clear, you're beef is with WG 2 isn't it? If so, would you care to speculate as to whether or not similar failings exist with WG3 or WG1? If not, why not?
cheers,
I think it's good to know about stuff, and to ask experts to tell you about stuff they know about.
For my work, I need to know what people know about climate change. HOWEVER, the international science panel approach does not seem to be working, so I was proposing an alternative.
Harrywr2
A LEADING British government scientist has warned the United Nations’ climate panel to tackle its blunders or lose all credibility.
Robert Watson, chief scientist at Defra, the environment ministry, who chaired the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) from 1997 to 2002, was speaking after more potential inaccuracies emerged in the IPCC’s 2007 benchmark report on global warming.
The most important is a claim that global warming could cut rain-fed north African crop production by up to 50% by 2020, a remarkably short time for such a dramatic change. The claim has been quoted in speeches by Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, and by Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general.
This weekend Professor Chris Field, the new lead author of the IPCC’s climate impacts team, told The Sunday Times that he could find nothing in the report to support the claim. The revelation follows the IPCC’s retraction of a claim that the Himalayan glaciers might all melt by 2035.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7017907.ece
Roger - in 2006, you said this:
"It makes no sense to me that the numbers would be generated through some procedure outside the peer-reviewed literature, as this is outside the scope of the IPCC’s mandate."
Now, we are told that "gray literature" was acceptable all along. I believe you actually agreed with this in a recent post. What gives?
Perhaps we are taking these "projections" too seriously. Science is not about making a set of assumptions and then claiming (with no empirical evidence) that the result is "science."
For this to be an accurate prediction (50% of rainfed crop production) we would have to know how the climate will change (exactly in time and space, as different varieties and species of crop plants respond to changes differently at different times of the year, and respond to temperature and water differences), we would have to know how the crop plants (all of them used) would respond to the unknown future(bet there's not tons of research on that), we would have to know that intentional crop breeding would not be able to keep up with the changes, and that people weren't capable of switching to other crops. Since we don't know any of those things, I don't see how anyone could have ever believed that number in the first place.
What is "spot on" about being rejected?
Roger, who were you rejected by?
That hurricanes should increase IF the theory is correct isn't the same as they WILL increase. It needs tested and so far the theory has failed the test. There are a couple of studies that explain why it isn't even that simplistic. This is one of them: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070417182843.htm
"Climate model simulations for the 21st century indicate a robust increase in wind shear in the tropical Atlantic due to global warming, which may inhibit hurricane development and intensification. Historically, increased wind shear has been associated with reduced hurricane activity and intensity"
But here's a funny thing - for balance:
Michael Mann finds "Reconstructions of past hurricane activity in the Atlantic Ocean indicate that the most active hurricane period in the past was during the "Medieval Climate Anomaly" about a thousand years ago when climate conditions created a "perfect storm" of La Niña-like conditions combined with warm tropical Atlantic waters." And it's funny because Mann's first argument that there was no MWP, and his 2nd argument that it was confined to europe are both jettisoned by him because he wants to prove a MWP-hurricane link. Funny thing this climate science - you are allowed so many contradictions without them impinging on each other!
Well it's clearly not just a two variable linear relationship as some people prefer to believe.
But I wonder why nobody emphasizes that there is an absolute consensus now that the frequency of hurricanes should reduce in a warming world. After all you'd think that;
increased_strength x reduced_number = similar_risk.
Well I don't really wonder why...optimism isn't allowed in discussing climate. It's funny to look back at the predictions for global cooling in the 70's.
Chapter 5 of this online book is interesting - especially table 5-1: ECONOMIC COSTS OF COOLING AND WARMING: DOT STUDY ref. D’Arge 1974, 568, table 1.
http://www.stanford.edu/~moore/Climate_of_Fear.pdf
Apparently when cooling is expected then warming is good for us but when warming is expected then it's a different story entirely. Institutionalized pessimism it seems.
Making a series of assumptions, even if you quantify them, even if you publish in a peer reviewed journal, is not "science" in the sense of a process that tries to understand the real world. It is like asking Nature a question and not waiting around for the answer.
Btw Roger, I'm glad that you moved your blog from Prometheus to here.
I thought it was a complete conflict of interest in the way that you screened all posts & comments to Prometheus when is was not specifically "your" blog. Some colleagues of mine tried posting to Prometheus and you flat out rejected them even though they had written very eloquent posts about science policy events; they weren't responding to a post of yours.
You did do this; I saw it in action.
You can choose not to post this comment; It doesn't matter as long as you read it. Its an improvement.
Sharon,
The IPCC predictions were not just based on assumptions. They were the results of computer models. The minor detail that the computer models were in turn based on a set of assumptions is another problem.
Please see http://www.rocketscientistsjournal.com/2009/03/_internal_modeling_mistakes_by.html for some of the problematic assumptions used by the IPCC models. My favorite is that the climate was at equilibrium in 1750 as the little ice age was ending.
I’d like to wait around for your answer but a glass of wine is calling. Hmmmm maybe if global warming really kicks in wine grapes can be grown all across the Midwest. But good consequences of warming are rarely mentioned.
Maurice- my point was that assumptions are assumptions, and if you quantify them it does not add reality. Putting quantified assumptions into models just layers assumptions of model parameters with the assumptions in the actual model. If x is some function (you assumed what the function is) of some parameter (which you assumed to be something). You can derive obtuse functions of functions, but they are still based on assumptions. And the value of science is not building up impenetrable layers of assumptions.. I think.. but perhaps I need a glass of wine.
Sharon,
You’ve got it. That leads us back to the topic of this thread; the credibility of the IPCC.
A major goal of the IPCC was to create an aura of authority in order to influence policy. For example; if the assumption that the climate was in equilibrium in 1750 was made openly it would have provoked open skepticism. Building that same assumption into a computer model hid the offending assumption behind an inscrutable computer program.
Think of the computer models as the curtain in the Land of Oz. The models are pretty impressive as long as you don’t look at the man behind the curtain. The Climategate documents have ripped the curtain down and the credibility of the IPCC has been irreparably damaged.
Please note that nothing in Climategate has invalidated the science behind AGW. But the IPCC can never again influence national policy with an appeal to authority argument.
I guess what bothers me is that the underlying problem is not the motives of the IPCC; the problem is that people expect policymakers to use models without proof that they actually predict natural events.
They also expect that if you get a big bunch of scientists together they will agree and that should inform policy.. by dint of a "scientist opinion poll." If you think that these are the underlying problems, then no group, could be expected to produce "useful truths" from models plus a bunch of scientists.
So I am not blaming the IPCC, I am blaming the overly facile underlying assumptions behind its establishment.
I have done some thinking and analysis of Bert Bolin (the first chairman of the IPCC). Bolin wrote the first climate policy proposal in 1975 in Sweden. From that time and throughout the 1980s he was very influencial on policymaking and more or less the only advocating climate expert in Sweden. It is clear to me that Bolin 1) believ that science is objective, that good science are quantitative and so on in a typical hard natural science way of thinking 2) are concerned on world poverty and green issues 3) act like a diplomat, very careful, in search for pragmatic compromises between scientists as wel as between science and politics 4) hold a firm belief in the linear model of science and policymaking 5) believ that to be careful, that science don´t state to much, is crucial to establish climate change as an policy issue. Science should not rush climate into policy because that may lead to a backlash. Its better to consistently build a scientific concensus and from there policymaking will follow sooner or later.
I wonder what Bolin would say about the IPCC situation today (Bolin is dead since a few years back). My own reflection is that Bolin was strategically right. It was a good way to establish climate policy. However, when this is done, the same approach is a rather poor way to more ahead.
There's also a problem with the related concept of a "consensus model". You take n models, none of which match observations very well, and average them. If models were data and the errors were random, that might be a valid approach, but the former is absolutely not true and the latter highly doubtful.
In England, the game you called "telephone" is known as "Chinese Whispers". The classic CW I was taught at school tells of a WW1 message from the front which started out as "Send reinforcements, we're going to advance". By the time it had been passed on to HQ by three or four field radio operators, it read: "Send Three and Fourpence, we're going to a dance" ("Three and Fourpence"; old English money before decimalisation in 1972, 3 shillings and 4 pennies. 12 pennies to a shilling, 20 shillings to an English pound).
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