[UPDATE: WUWT has decided to take down their post. But the internet has a deep memory -- Here it is for those interested.]
If you are visiting here from Watts Up With That, welcome. Here is a link to my book, which was reviewed at WUWT, by a guest poster Shub Niggurath and approved by Anthony Watts (the latter included as an update at the request of AW).
Before I launch into a response, let me first say that while critiquing my book is fair game, critiquing my interest in sport!? Over the line;-) For the good folks at WUWT I have provided a sporting interpretation of their review above. Enjoy! And now a few thoughts in response . . .
The "substance" of the review is disappointing, as it is mainly an extended ad hominem attack on me based on my claim that the debate over the science of climate change is pretty much over as far as public opinion is concerned, and further, that continued such debate is utterly irrelevant to the broader policy debate. Of course, those who seek to politicize science in the name of climate politics exist on both sides of the debate and both find fault in the argument that science is a weak lever in political debates. With a broad agreement like that, it is no surprise that climate science has become so politicized.
Here are a few excerpts from the review:
You can forever hang around making half-baked public statements to draw attention, and simply wave away questions with “The answers are in my book”. . . Roger Pielke Jr has been doing that for a while. . .The review then goes on an extended discussion of several reports that are not discussed in my book but which the author does not like. The author then returns to discussing me, and this line is particularly fun:
While the first two chapters are rambling one can hack away at the fluffy text . . .
Pielke the Junior informs the reader that when his dad was writing basic encyclopedia articles on climate he was not interested in the science and was instead running behind girls and playing soccer . . .
Calling it disingenuous would be going easy. Pielke Jr is not alone in this either. As he reports in his book Bill McKibben, a Pielke favourite, managed to convince ‘mostly poor’ 92 island nations about the risk of global warming. . .The author, with ad hom to spare, gets my colleague Max Boykoff into the act (fortunately he is unaware of Max's sporting interests;-):
The absurd consequences of such stage-managed opinions and the resulting neuroticism is clearly evident in a paper by Max Boykoff, one of Pielke’s colleagues at his Colorado institute.The author can't even figure out what he is writing about. To make the case that the public does not want to take action on climate change, he attacks what I call the "iron law of climate change":
[T]he so-called ‘iron law’ is an enormous non-sequitur, and just a small outcome of a more general ‘iron law of scams’.Um, OK. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to figure out that logic;-)
I appreciate it a great deal when people take the time to read my books, as there is a lot of competition out there for the attention of readers. WUWT has published a review that says more about WUWT than it does any of the arguments in my book. Nonetheless, perhaps they might bring it to the attention of a few readers who are interested in what the book actually says, and for that I am grateful.
46 comments:
Roger,
My impression is that the essay was less about your book, and more about your recent, unfortunate, essay on skeptics.
I think reasonable people, skeptic or believer, would find something instructive from your book, which I found useful and informative. You show clearly that most AGW inspired claims about how to deal with climate are failures.
My response to your thread regarding skeptics follows. Between a posting problem from work, and an unplanned health crisis, I have not been on line much lately.
I offer this as someone who taken the time to read your work and have gotten much out of it.
Pielke, jr. seems to be riding two horses.
Academic survival in general and in Boulder more particularly is not something for people who question certain things. Has academia been shown to be immune from tribalism? Is Boulder well known for its open inquiry and tolerant social milieu?
The particular post of his is probably not one of your worst, but it is not from lack of trying. It is factually misleading, which is unusual. I look to Roger for tough insights. His tough minded outlook has led him to demonstrate how the AGW community has over stated the risks of CO2 regarding weather events time and time again. His insights show how AGW demanded policies regarding wind and solar and CO2 limits are nothing more than financial scams and political posturing and fail to achieve their goals are important.
But his post that this thread is based on for some reason falls into Trenberth's fallacy regarding the null hypothesis: If CO2 changes the climate at all, then anything the AGW community wants do is justified.
That has been shown to be a massive fail, and Pielke's work shows this time and time again.
So why the post? I do not know, of course. Perhaps he looked at the logical extension from pointing out so well that the AGW community is so wrong, and recoiled from admitting that those pesky unwashed prole skeptics have been correct the entire time regarding AGW community issues.
Perhaps he is failing to parse between skeptics who, like the sky dragons, are sadly confused on physics and the vast majority of skeptics who recognize the physics and question the interpretation the AGW community applies.
AGW is the eugenics of our day: a huge social movement that has attracted leading politicians, academics and power players from around the world to agree to push for ridiculous legislative solutions to things they do not understand nearly as well as they wish. The proof of this is in the failure of each and every AGW community demanded policy and treaty.
Which, ironically, Roger Pielke, Jr. has documented very well.
I'm not sure he actually read more than the first two chapters of your book. His rather lengthy blog-post could probably be best summarized in one phrase "we are SO! relevant" But if you have write pages arguing you're relevant, you almost certainly aren't.
I've concluded that everyone complains about the climate, but no one ever does anything anything about it. Therefore, are weather and climate really that different?
-1-FF&S
Sorry to hear about the health issues, best wishes for a speedy and full recovery.
Believe it or not -- I really do agree with the arguments that science does not drive much less dictate policy outcomes or political views.
And don't worry about Boulder -- a fine place to live and work;-)
Thanks!
I continue to get the sense that WUWT is desperate to find a new reason for its existence now that its core complaint (about the reliability of estimates of recent warming http://nyti.ms/mXWxKr ) has been largely dismantled. Maybe this marks a shift to the hard right in search of page views and a new lease on life?
Roger,
Not that I agree with the WUWT review of your book, but as I begin to work through your book, a couple of questions have arisen, which I wondered whether you might be able to take a little time to clarify. My apologies if the answers to these questions become apparent later in your book.
In Chapter 1, you set up an argument as follows: "Because political battles over climate change have been fought through science since 1988, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that adversaries on either side of that debate have agreed about core aspects of the science since that time. As I'll argue, that core understanding is sufficient to form the basis for a commonsense approach to climate change."
1) What constitutes the "core" understanding that is shared by adversaries on either side of the debate?
Is it everything that is in the section entitled "Carbon Dioxide is Important, but Climate Change Involves Much More"? (Which itself delineates some disagreements.) Is it a subset of this section - for example, Andy Revkin's list, cited within? Or, is it something else? Would you be able to point me towards the sections in the book that are intended to outline "core" beliefs, or if it is easier, could you sketch out such a list?
2) I am also someone befuddled by the argument structure in this chapter. If appears that your argument is such: "There is a "core" of scientific belief upon which consensus has been reached by everyone in the debate. Based upon this core, we can formulate an optimal policy." But I think that I must be misunderstanding the argument structure, because it is one that you frequently take to task, and that does not comport with the experiences that your experience in the office of Radford Byerly. Am I misunderstanding it? If so, what work is the "core" scientific beliefs argument supposed to do?
-5-sojournment
Sure, easy enough ... Chapter 1 in a nutshell ...
1. Everyone (defined as those from Singer to Hansen) agrees that humans can influence the climate system.
2. People disagree about the importance and risks associated with that influence (some say small some say large, see Schneider quote on this point).
3. In any case, efforts to resolve a debate about risks far in the future is futile and subject to ample politicization
4. Fortunately, we need not resolve that debate in order to develop policies that decarbonize the economy because there are other (and more immediate) reasons why doing so makes sense
5. The science of climate change suggests that there is an issue that we may wish to consider, that is it. It gives no help in deciding what specifically to do, if anything -- to resolve the questions over action requires a broader perspective.
Roger,
Thank you for the kind thoughts. Fortunately, modern medicine is more reliable than AGW policy solutions. I am sure Boulder is beautiful.
Andy,
You demonstrate a lack of understanding regarding WUWT in particular, skeptics in general, and sadly the science itself that is breath taking for a science journalist. But your wish does seem, not surprisingly, exactly what a true believer wishes skeptics would do: be quiet and go away.
How is it possible, after all of this time, for you to plod on and still not get it? Your attribution of cynical motives combined with apparent ignorance is a very interesting combination. Are you shutting down your blog now that is clear that the claims of CO2 caused climate crisis were vastly over stated and that your neo-Malthusian concerns about population problems are misplaced? Or are you going to flail around looking for the next big scare to promote and profit from? Or perhaps you care deeply about the topics you cover and will do so as for as long as you can?
Andy, I'm not sure of the logic there, as I wouldn't take the "best" of Muller's arguments as anything more than a confirmation of what has been found by others already. Except it's riddled with errors created by the hurried nature of the write-ups which as far as I can tell were fueled in turn by trying to meet the deadline for AR5.
As one quick example, I'll note their UHI effect has flipped sign and now matches what is found by other groups. Another is the totally misleading and erroneous Figure 2 from their paper.
As far as I can see, this was just a guest post by Shub, and this particular post says more about the very low standards for accepting articles for publication on WUWT, and Shub's personal very low standards for how he wants to represent his own writing and analytic abilities, than it does about any sudden shift in the WUWT mission statement.
While I happen to agree with you they need to have a plan in place for contrarianism after the end of skepticism over the accuracy of the surface land record, I don't think the highly self-inflated contribution by BEST should add much urgency to that future planning...
WUWT makes one good point, that there is a disconnect between the claim that the debate is over, and the admission that climate change always ranks last. That there is a disconnect doesn't mean they're mutually exclusive, I just found reconciling the two points is something the book does not do. Maybe I missed it.
While reading I wondered, how is recognition of an iron law not also a demonstration of a lack of will? If people aren't willing to do anything, doesn't that mean the debate is not yet won?
#4
I continue to get the sense that WUWT is desperate to find a new reason for its existence
I think we could say that about all sides of the climate debate.
Rising international coal prices are going to drive a 'clean energy quest' regardless of what anyone believes about 'climate change'.
When selfish economics + environmentalism point in the same direction there isn't much to discuss.
-9-Chris Chambers
Governments, business and households deal with many, many issues at the same time. Not all of the same priority.
For instance -- I really need to fix my BBQ grill, but I also need to pay the mortgage. No argument can be made that fixing my grill is more important than paying my mortgage. But I can figure out how to get both done, given their respective ranking in my prioritization scheme. (And the debate over the state of the grill is indeed over;-)
"Will" to act does not mean "top priority" -- we act on all sorts of things that are low priority, because we have both "will" and a "way."
People are willing to act on climate, the experts just refuse to listen;-)
Ask again if unclear ...
Thanks!
I saw the post, and am currently in the middle of chapter 3 of TCF. From reading here, and reading the book, here's my take on Roger's claims about the debate being over.
There is a fair amount of public support in the US for some sort of action on climate change. The US Government has acted on many issues with even less support than exists over climate change. The uncertainty about climate change is likely to continue, so there's no good reason to suspect that support will change.
So, from a public policy perspective, we're to the point where something could happen. Or not. Policy making is all rather messy, of course, and support for a generic action is almost always more popular than something specific.
Now, I agree with Roger regarding "the debate" as far as this goes. However, with respect to any particular policy, I think the debate over the science is important at least for my support (extraordinary proof for extraordinary claims, etc, etc), but that's not really what Roger is talking about, even though that's how it is commonly interpreted, I suspect at least in part due to the common refrain about the science being settled. A more cynical man than me might think Roger was essentially trolling for readers for his book (which seemed to be a main claim made by Shrub).
Roger: One aspect of your book that is underappreciated arises in between the lines of your 5-point outline:
It is scientifically plausible, although highly uncertain, that anthropogenic climate change will indeed be globally catastrophic and irreversible.
If such catastrophic warming really does have a threshold near one of the commonly cited values (2C, 3C, 450 ppm CO2e, 550ppm CO2e, etc.), there is no political will or technological capability to prevent the catastrophe.
The best we can do is throw our efforts toward fairly small programs to stimulate the development and deployment of new low-carbon energy technology, despite not knowing how to run such innovation projects successfully.
Therefore, the greatest determinant of a successful climate policy will be whether we're lucky and climate sensitivity is on the low side of the uncertainty distribution (although you do argue that air-capture may be a plausible backstop).
I'm being a bit tendentious here, but I believe from our exchanges on the subject that this is a reasonable reading of your analysis, even if it's not emphasizing the same aspects that you would highlight. This is part of why climate change is a wicked problem. If I'm misreading your analysis, please correct me.
Priorities obviously exist. But why bother point out that the debate is over and climate initiatives have the same support they've always had, if it means nothing? Am I right that the answer is so activists get off the science and get on the policy? Preoccupation with the science is a strong theme of the book.
Americans support change, but only as their last of all priorities. It seems like a very low standard to look at that and say "yep, the political will is there." It's a semantic argument, but if the iron law exists, isn't it reasonable to say that people lack the political will, as you criticize Al Gore for doing?
-13-Jonathan Gilligan
Yes, there is more in there and your summary is just fine, but of course that is why it is a book chapter not a blog comment ;-)
Now the quibbles -- I do not use the term "climate sensitivity" in the book. I don't know if a technology-led approach can or cannot lead to stabilization of CO2 at low levels -- nobody does. There is no need for such programs to be small (I actually call for ones that are very large by anyone's definition). But quibbles, as I suspect you are relating more your interpretation than what I actually said.
Finally, we need "luck" in many areas -- asteroid impacts, wheat rust, infectious disease, European fiscal and monetary union ... the list has no end and the need for luck, so that doesn't distinguish climate change from many other areas ... Thanks!
-14-Chris Chambers
"Preoccupation with the science is a strong theme of the book"
Actually WGI-type science occupies 1 of 9 chapters.
"Americans support change, but only as their last of all priorities"
Last on a list of 20 -- Americans have many more priorities than just 20.
"but if the iron law exists, isn't it reasonable to say that people lack the political will"
The question is one of policy design -- do we (a) try to change public opinion to fit what would be needed for certain policies, or (b) try to fit policies to what public opinion is?
In TCF I argue (b).
Thanks!
@11
Roger, if I could make a tweak to your analogy I think it would be a little more illustrative.
The BBQ is a non-essential item (though some would disagree, possibly even myself in my love of a finely grilled steak), perhaps a better example would be an issue with the furnace.
Let's say the furnace has been acting up lately, seemingly getting warmer than the intended thermostat setting. Now, this hasn't been anything disastrous, certainly not worth missing a mortgage payment over to have repaired but something curious nevertheless. The wife insists that you have the furnace inspected by a professional. The professional indicates that while the problem appears to be minimal right now it "could" become far worse, even an explosion. He advises that in his opinion it would be optimal to replace the whole furnace. This would be very expensive and expenses are tight right now as it is. Another expert advises that while the furnace is certainly warming, the "explosion" scenario seems unlikely. The wife is unwilling to tolerate any risk and insists that the furnace is replaced immediately, no matter the cost while the husband feels it more sound to wait and save money to replace the furnace instead of jeopardizing the household finances.
Keep in mind that the wife tends to enjoy blowing money regardless of consequence and the furnace expert is also interested in selling you a new furnace.
Would the debate be over in this circumstance because the majority of furnace experts in town recommend that you replace the furnace? What if the wife starts panicking that the furnace explosion a couple of the furnace experts warned might be possible is imminent? What if she starts attributing every little creak and crack the house makes to the bad furnace? Or when the cable goes out as it sometimes does she claims that it "might" be connected to the bad furnace?
Would you not want to actually talk (and debate?)about the "facts" so to make a rational decision?
Uhm... What the heck was that article about, anyway???
Half way through, I started hearing echos of an almost certainly made-up George Pattons quib, made famous in the George C Scott movie, paraphrased:
"Roger... You magnificent bastard! I read your book!!!".
Anthony Watts, at Watts Up With That says:
"I have removed this guest post [by Shub Niggurath] because it has been brought to my attention that it is unfair and has caused inflamed reactions [especially in comments] that were unintended. It was my mistake for posting it without seeing this, and my decision to remove it. – Anthony Watts"
-17-Menth
"Would you not want to actually talk (and debate?)about the "facts" so to make a rational decision?"
Depends on the characteristics of the wife. ;-)
#13 Jonothan Giligan
Therefore, the greatest determinant of a successful climate policy will be whether we're lucky......
I would insert 'and one of the myriad of 'emerging' clean and cheap energy technologies actually 'emerges'.
"If such catastrophic warming really does have a threshold near one of the commonly cited values (2C, 3C, 450 ppm CO2e, 550ppm CO2e, etc.), there is no political will or technological capability to prevent the catastrophe."
Both of these thresholds were reached or surpassed in recorded history,(2c during the Roman Warm Period, 3C during the Medieval Warm Period) without catastrophe, and more importantly without human co2 input.
Roger, I appreciate that you need to take every opportunity to plug your book, but Shub Niggurath's post (which is on his blog, with an enthusiastic comment from Hilary Ostrov) was in fact not a review of your book, but a response to your curious recent claim that the climate science debate was over. He only goes on to your book because when questioned about this claim, your response was to ask people what they disagreed with in chapters 1 and 2 of your book. This was tricky to answer, because there is virtually nothing about the science of climate change in your book.
In fact the debate over the science is intensifying, since we now know from climategate 2 that many of the scientists involved were aware that some of the 'reconstructions' used by the IPCC were 'crap'.
-23-PaulM
"there is virtually nothing about the science of climate change in your book"
See another comment above:
"Preoccupation with the science is a strong theme of the book"
;-)
Chapter 1 is on the science. What part of that chapter do you disagree with? The non-review review didn't actually discuss Chapter 1, did it?
I love the hypocrissy of Revkin (#3) throwing crap at Watts for allowing a guest contributor to express his "extreme" ideas and then suggesting it may be proof of some new crazy mission by Watts. By this post from Revkin I guess we can now infer Revkin's new mission is one of being batcrap crazy and extreme based on his coverage of Naomi Klein's insane musings on his blog.
When one is full of crap it must be easier to find crap to sling at others right Andy? Naomi Klein's views are still on display at Dot Earth and somehow Niggurath's views have been taken down at WUWT. :-) Looks like Watts cleaned up his crap Andy, will you? If not keep it to yourself and don't throw it at others.
I must say I was a bit dismayed to see the entire post and comments disappear from WUWT. Has that ever happened on any blog before? Up to them of course, it's their blog - Watts and his helpers, but draconian nevertheless. Especially since it means my few words of wisdom were also washed down the plughole!
As I recall my main point was to do with my puzzlement over why anyone could assert there was any debate at all over whether humans have an effect on climate, and that essentially the statement that they do is a mere platitude (as is 'climate changes'). However it has become a loaded term since political activists love asserting that 'the debate is over', 'the science is settled', 99.9% of dog-lovers believe that 'man effects the climate' and so on, each time with the implication, sometimes but not always explicit, that the effects are so large as to be bringing us to catastrophe. Yet there is no convincing evidence of such a large effect. In my reading of the situation, it has and is proving extremely difficult to distinguish an effect of CO2 rises, not least because nothing particularly unusual has been happening to climate events anywhere.
This careless use of language, and of science, is no mere quibble given the immense and destructive transformations of society being proposed. The assertion of a platitude followed by a call to action is puzzling indeed. The big questions remain once we have agreed these two platitudes: (a) climate changes (b) humans, along with everything else, have an effect on climate. The big questions are what are these effects of humans, how large are they (and in which direction), how will we know / detect them. The hideous, and I choose that word deliberately, grandstanding alarmism of a handful of core climate scientists around CO2 has been ruthlessy and very effectively exploited by waves of activists. A more careful use of terminology and concepts will be required to reduce the awful damage that they have and will cause to lives, livelihoods, politics, international relations, and last but not least, to the human spirit itself.
Roger (re: comment 6),
If I understand the list correctly, items #4 and 5 serve to clarify the role of the "core" aspects of climate science vis-a-vis public policy. (Please correct me if I am mistaken) i.e. It is unnecessary to resolve scientific debate, because there are other reasons supporting a proposed policy, but it is an issue which we might wish to consider.
However, I am not sure if this is entirely consistent with Chapter 1. I do not mean to mischaracterize the thrust the argument, but it does seem to be structured a little differently than in your list, above. For example, you write that:
"Dispite any number of disagreements about the various scientific issues associated with climate change and where the balance of evidence on those issues lies, research since that time has underscore this core understanding. Fortunately, despite the points on which our general understanding of climate science could be, and ought to be, more nuanced, *a commonsence approach to climate policy requires no more agreement on climate science than on such very basic ideas.*"
As I understand the structure of the argument,the issue of climate change involves more than a narrow focus on CO2; yet (as stated in Chapter 1, at least), the argument structure seems to base a policy recommendation upon a particular scientific understanding (i.e. that scientific understanding which you designate as "core").
Is this a correct interpretation?
If it is, then the question will arise (both from an IPCC-centric audience and a skeptic-centric audience) why the scientific understanding which you designate as "core" should be privileged above the scientific understanding that they have. It would also seem to call your "meta" criticism of science-based politics into question.
-25-sojournment
Thanks .. a few replies:
1. CO2 is not the same thing as "climate change" (see pp. 16-17), but my analysis in Chapters 2-4 focuses on CO2 for reasons stated.
2. One could successfully deal with CO2 and still have issues to deal with related to human-caused climate change (see various from RP Sr. et al. on this point)
3. The policy recommendations are not "based on" a particular scientific understanding. I would argue that the policy options that I recommend are pretty much insensitive to one's views on climate science.
4. I am arguing that the science that I am presenting in Chapter 1 will be found to be pretty much in agreement among both sides that you describe. Each may believe other things, and disagree with one another, which is fine, but irrelevant to my argument.
Please ask again if unclear!
Roger,
Re: #1 & #2 - Understood. I was paraphrasing a later sentence in the same paragraph which highlighted the importance of non-CO2.
Re: #3 - Understood. Policy insensitivity to one's views of climate science is a central thesis that you regularly advance. This thesis, in fact, is why I am somewhat surprised at Chapter 1, which I (perhaps mistakenly) do not see as entirely consistent with this thesis.
Re: #4 - This is what I don't quite understand. For the sake of argument, let's say that you correctly describe a set of beliefs held by both IPCC 4 and skeptics ("Core Beliefs"). Assuming #3 - i.e. policy is insensitive to Core Beliefs - then Core Beliefs should be irrelevant to your argument.
Yet, several times in this chapter (including those which I cited above), it appears that a policy recommendation rests upon them. For example, when you write that "a common sense approach to climate policy requires no more agreement on climate science than on such very basic ideas." (And, it would be somewhat a strange thing to start an argument with a chapter on a subject which is arguably irrelevant.)
But if, as you say, scientific beliefs (including "Core Beliefs") are irrelevant to your argument, then I'll take your word for it.
Yet, that brings up a further question: if there exists a set of scientific beliefs held by everyone (e.g. your designated Core Beliefs), why on earth should such beliefs be irrelevant to policy?
-29-sojournment
If one falls somewhere between Singer and Hansen on climate science, then I'd argue that this gets you to a place where you ask the question, is climate an issue that we should think about action on --- Answer, yes.
But when you get into the issue you find that further exploration of the science does not get you much further (or alternatively leads people to different directions based on their underlying values, views on uncertainty, etc.).
So at that point I say, the good news is that we can find a common basis for action based on other factors.
I'd suggest also having a look at The Hartwell Paper which tries to advance a similar argument, Thanks!
Thank you for the recommendation to look at The Hartwell Paper. I have read reviews of it, and perhaps after I finish your book, I will get to it. However, as you often direct readers to your book in order to understand your argument, and as I have finally purchased and begun reading it, I would prefer to receive clarity on the argument presented within it before reaching further afield.
The basic issue that I see in Chapter 1 is this: you appear to select a set of beliefs (e.g. those that fall somewhere between Singer and Hansen) and then (at least in Chapter 1 of your book) you don't just make a mild claim that this is an merely issue to consider; rather, you make the claim a commonsense climate policy requires agreement upon this set of scientific beliefs.
Because, methodologically, it appears that in Chapter 1 all that you've done is select a set of beliefs based upon certain parameters (e.g. those beliefs that fall between Singer and Hansen), and then privilege *those* beliefs as being necessary to the formulation of climate policy, it appears that (a) others may select a set of scientific beliefs based upon different parameters; it is unclear why your set of beliefs or parameters should be privileged above theirs, and (b) that this move is inconsistent with your criticism that climate policy should be insensitive to climate science (yet, if there is a set of scientific Core Beliefs held by everyone, it is unclear why they should be irrelevant to policy).
Sorry to re-state this, but it is a methodological tension which often appears in your blog posts (why should one even care about whether certain extreme weather is increasing in frequency or not, if such frequency is irrelevant to policy?), and it is someone confusing in your book. Others have different parameters for choosing privileged scientific beliefs (e.g. consensus beliefs contained in peer-reviewed work, even if they are not held by skeptics), but the epistemic argument for choosing your parameters rather than theirs is left un-argued.
-31-sojournment
Perhaps you could point me to where I say anything like:
"you make the claim a commonsense climate policy requires agreement upon this set of scientific beliefs"
Read the last paragraph of the Chapter which says the opposite ;-)
-32-continued ...
A second point, you ask:
"why should one even care about whether certain extreme weather is increasing in frequency or not, if such frequency is irrelevant to policy?"
Well, it depends on what policy you are talking about. If you are talking about emissions reduction policy, then it is not relevant to that policy (even as it is relevant to the politics).
If you are talking about policies for managing the reinsurance risks of disasters, then it is directly relevant.
There is no tension here, just a need for contextual specificity and clarity.
The comment from Andrew Revkin is disappointing.
For several weeks, Anthony Watts has been soliciting guest posts because of pressures on his time, including running his business (I guess the Exxon check was late this month).
It seems perhaps that it's hard for folks with more or less guaranteed income streams to understand the circumstances volunteer bloggers may face.
"Perhaps you could point me to where I say anything like: 'you make the claim a commonsense climate policy requires agreement upon this set of scientific beliefs'"
Happy to do so. I am referring to the following passages in Chapter 1:
"Because political battles over climate change have been fought through since since 1988, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that adversaries on either side of that debate have agreed about core aspects of the science since that time. As I'll argue, that core understanding is sufficient to form the basis for a commonsense approach to climate policy. Such an approach will recognize that science can alert us to a potential problem and provide some insight about the consequences of different policy choices, but science cannot decide what choices we ultimately make."
"Fortunately, despite the points on which our general understanding of climate science could be, and ought to be, more nuanced, a commonsense approach to climate science requires no more agreement on climate science than on such very basic ideas... The heat of the climate debate can obscure the fact that there is a shared understanding of the role of carbon dioxide held by everyone in the debate. A narrow focus on carbon dioxide is double-edged: it gives a sense of priority to one very important aspect of the human influence on the climate system, but it can obscure the fact that the issue of climate change involves so much more."
"We leave this chapter behind knowing that achieving consensus on many aspects of climate science is unnecessary for action to take place. The scientific consensus that held in 1988 between S. Fred Singer and James Hansen was enough to form the basis for action. The more difficult question, of course, is, what action?"
-35-sojournment
Thanks .. apologies for any lack of clarity on my part (I think that the "science" in your second excerpt should be "policy)
These passages do not mean that such an understanding is required, but rather, this is all the science that you need to understand (i.e., "sufficient") in order to move on in the debate. Again, if you accept that core understanding then you have a basis for action, (where "basis" should be read as "a starting point") -- what action? is of course the next question.
If you want to completely reject this core understanding, as I call the shared area of agreement between Singer and Hansen, that is fine I guess (who rejects that? Seriously?), but then we are no longer talking about climate policy -- perhaps we are then talking about energy policy.
But let me be absolutely clear. Nowhere do I say that such an understanding is _required_ to accept my policy recommendations. Far from it.
Thanks!
Fair enough. And, many thanks for clarifying what may have been sloppy reading on my part - it is much appreciated.
I guess my follow-up question is: supposing the existence of a universally-shared scientific understanding of climate change, why should such an understanding be irrelevant to climate policy?
To be clear, I am personally persuaded that a much broader base of scientific knowledge than that which is shared by climate skeptics is relevant to climate policy; but for the purposes of Chapter 1, I am unsure why the subset of belief which I presumably share with people who otherwise disagree with me should be irrelevant to policy consideration. However, as answering this question is not within the domain of Chapter 1, I look for it to be answered in the remainder of the book.
In any case, thank you for your responses on this thread, they are much appreciated.
-37-sojournment
Thanks, I am happy to discuss ... on your question:
"why should such an understanding be irrelevant to climate policy?"
Again, what I am saying is such an understanding is not required, which is different that "should be irrelevant."
People will come to support action on decarbonization for many reasons. Some will support decarbonization explicitly, and others will support actions for which decarbonization is simply a by-product. Some people may ground their support in science and others will not. Political action is (almost) always a mishmash of reasons and understandings. That is how politics works.
As you work you way through the book, keep you eye out for a paraphrase of Walter Lippmann, that is I think the key point here.
Thanks!
Ok. I'm not trying to pose an unfair question, but what would your answer be to the following question: "Should one consider climate science when formulating climate policy?" I'm imagining that the answer will be in the form of "Yes, because X, Y, and Z," or "No, because X, Y, and Z."
Because you assert that an understanding of climate science is unnecessary to the formulation of climate policy, I understand your answer to be in the form of "No, one need not consider climate science when formulating climate policy, for X, Y, and Z reasons" (with X, Y, and Z to be further explained in the book).
If relevance is measured on a scale, at a certain threshold, I would imagine that your answer would turn to from "No" to "Yes." Fir example, suppose that climate science predicted a near-term and certainly costly state of the world, rather than a distant and less certainly costly state of the world. I would imagine that, at some near term and certainly costly point, you would consider the risk relevant enough that one "ought" to consider it. But, if you would disagree with this characterization, please feel free to correct me.
"Should one consider climate science when formulating climate policy?"
This is easy -- yes. But which science depends on which policy questions you are looking at.
Science is most directly relevant to decisions in contexts where values are shared and uncertainty is bounded if not reducible (see The Honest Broker;-).
It's all about the size of the tax isn't it?
You, me and a few others in the middle think that a small tax for alternatives is justified regardless of CO2.
The zealots, including the 'team' and many with vested interests want the public to be forced into decarbonisation and a small tax just won't do that. They desire a rather huge tax. For them derailing the consumerist society is a bonus. They don't care a jot about the 3rd world but they pretend to.
The public at large pretend to be green until they have to pay for it or change lifestyle. Then they rapidly turn brown. No tax at all will be welcomed; they point out, not unreasonably, that they are taxed enough already.
Shub and Anthony reflect right wingers who prefer to believe the fiction of the free market always being right and tax always being wrong. So if something costs too much without immediate benefit then it must be wrong. Of course even if the worst fears are correct, cutting CO2 apparently makes no difference to temperature so it can never make any sense to them. But as it stands they think the activist scientists are charlatans (with plenty of justification). So there goes 50% of the voting public. They don't care either about the 3rd world but they also pretend to.
Governments of course don't need to care about anyone; scientists, skeptics or the public they can pass whatever carbon tax they like. So why don't they? Could it be that deep down they don't really believe it is necessary?
Roger,
I think that I understand your position to be (and I am clearly capable of unintentionally misunderstanding) that an understanding of climate science should be considered when formulating climate policy, but that an understanding of climate science is not required to formulate climate policy. Is this a fair statement?
There are two ways that I can understand this position, but neither are an especially generous (or perhaps may even be an inaccurate) view of your position:
1) Certain climate policies are capable of being justified independently of considerations that may arise from an understanding of climate science. One should have an understanding of climate science in order to determine whether they provide additional persuasive reasons to adopt such policies; however, such reasons are unnecessary, because such policies are sufficiently justified by independent considerations.
2) One should have an understanding of climate science in order to help assess the costs and benefits of proposed climate policies. However, because climate science will be but one of many considerations that will enter into the political conversation, it is but a minor actor and therefore may be safely disregarded for all practical purposes.
My concern is that while both interpretations are consistent with the advocacy of a subset of policies that can be independently justified and/or enjoy sufficient public support to be enacted, they do not help one who has not already pre-selected such policies and wants to assess the entire universe of proposed policies.
Let me provide an example.
Suppose that we have 2 possible sources of power plant risks to human health: those resulting from emissions which pose risks that are local in nature (“Local Pollutants”), and those resulting from emissions which are not local in nature (“Global Pollutants”).
And suppose, for the sake of argument, that there are 3 types of proposed policies, only one of which can be implemented:
i) Local: Policies which are very effective at reducing risks posed by Local Pollutants, but are not very effective at reducing risks posed by Global Pollutants; these can be justified by reasons for reducing the former risks but not reasons for managing the latter risks.
ii) Local and Global: Policies which are only somewhat effective at reducing Local Pollutants and are only somewhat effective at reducing Global Pollutants; these can be justified by reasons for managing either type of risk.
iii) Global: Policies which are very effective at reducing Global Pollutants but are not at all effective at reducing Local Pollutants; these can only be justified by reasons for managing the former risks but not reasons for managing the latter risks.
If, when considering risks posed by Global Pollutants, we are limited to those policies which are independently justified by effectiveness at managing the risk of Local Pollutants (or to policies which enjoy political support for managing the risk of Local Pollutants), we are limited to consideration of Type II policies.
But, clearly, such a methodology pre-judges the outcome, and ignores two-thirds of possible solutions.
A superior method of risk assessment would be to assess Type I policies in light of a scientific understanding of Local Pollutants, Type III policies in light of a scientific understanding of Global Pollutants, and Type II policies in light of a scientific understanding of both types of pollutants.
Moreover – and as a final point - this is not to say that, given such a risk assessment, scientific understanding will dictate the choice between Types I, II, and III. One can accept the proposition that such a choice will be a function of, among other things, value judgments. But restricting policy consideration to Type II policies is itself a type of value judgment: it is a value-laden choice to declare scientific understanding of Global Pollutants as unnecessary, thereby privileging Type II policies which can be independently justified.
-42-sojournment
Here is another analogy ...
Experts think that exercise is good for health. I could (a) argue that understanding the science of exercise and health is necessary to justify and motivate someone to workout.
Or (b) I could set up a recreational football league and invite people to play, just for the fun of it.
(a) might work with some people, and (b) might work with others. What if (b) proves more effective as a matter of practicality?
In this example, understanding the science of exercise and health is neither necessary or sufficient to get people working out.
If we agree (because, e.g. shared values) that the goal is to persuade people to exercise and we know (because e.g. bounded certainty) that rec football achieves this goal as well as other types of exercise, then the choice between option (a) or (b) may simply be one of political expediency.
But as you point out, this hypothetical doesn't approximate the world that we live in.
What if we don't know whether exercise is the best option (rather than, e.g. diet), or - if exercise is the best option - if rec football, in particular, will be helpful (to, for example, the elderly)? Working backwards from a shared goal in the certainty that it will fix the problem seems to fly directly in the face of the challenge of heterogeneous values and uncertain risks.
If we want to conduct a risk assessment of the types of risks that we face and assess the relative efficacy of proposed risk policies, an analysis that excludes all but a a pre-chosen subset will have limited value. I would think (and, perhaps ironically, I believe that I skeptics would agree with me) that a superior methodology would be first, assess the risks to the best of our ability, and assess the relative efficacies of proposed risk policies to the best of our ability, and then, second, turn to the universe of the politically passable in which we argue about things like values.
-44-sojournment
Thanks for the continuing comments ... a quick reply:
"If we agree (because, e.g. shared values) that the goal is to persuade people to exercise and we know (because e.g. bounded certainty) that rec football achieves this goal as well as other types of exercise, then the choice between option (a) or (b) may simply be one of political expediency."
No.
There is no need to agree on values -- either means or ends -- to agree on a shared course of action. You might want health benefits and dislike sport, I might want some competition and care not at all about health -- yet, we meet up on the pitch for a game.
This is a key element of successful politics, people need not think like to act alike.
Thank you for your continuing participation as well - I do not believe that I have ever received such feedback from a blogger, much less the author of a book that I am reading. Your comments are appreciated, as is the opportunity to clarify my own thoughts on the matter.
I may have been unclear. If we a priori agree on a shared course of action, for whatever reason - including shared values - then the means by which we implement that shared course of action can be discussed in terms of political expediency. (i.e. this seems to suggest that the relevant disagreement is really is about implementation - i.e. should we persuade people with reasons that they find persuasive, or should be try to persuade people with reasons that they don't find persuasive?)
Should we use the most effective way to implement shared courses of action that we already agree upon? Sure.
My point is simply that:
(a) whether or not a policy goal is shared may at best be only coincidentally related to whether that policy will achieve an effective outcome, and
(b) the process of implementing a shared goal (i.e. which reasons should we choose to argue) has little to do with a reasoned assessment of pertinent risks or risk management.
This is why I would think that a public debate regarding risk assessment and risk management is necessary, and why choosing to discuss only a subset of policies that people might find independently persuasive to be excessively limiting.
Post a Comment