I’m not sure that describes me. I don’t think getting into the rest of your post will get us anywhere, so I won’t.
Did you have issues with what Aragorn wrote in this thread? Do you think he’s wrong? I liked what he wrote, a lot. Including his remarks about the problems with the process in this comment. For some reason I can’t get the quote function to work.
Begin Aragorn -
Meyer’s piece was actually a very good layperson overview of the general fracas. He gets some of the details wrong and there is much more to the story (naturally, as complex issues are almost always that way) but overall very good.
Very few–actually none–of the educated skeptics are “science deniers”. That is a strawman beaten to death, restuffed, then beaten to death again by media and political activists, as well as activist scientists (much like activist judges). And the occasional conspiracy theory loon who is an actual denier. You simply do not become the head of School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences (Judith Curry, formerly), or the MIT School of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences while being a crackpot or subpar scientist (Richard Lindzen, formerly). These scientists are some of the best in the world–although in my opinion Lindzen is a bit too crotchety in his statements these days, which allows his enemies to make total hay out of his public statements. He’s a scientist not a politician, and the people playing political activist are much better at it because they have been doing it so much longer.
As an aside here, think about the term “denier” or “science denier”. Meyer mentions it at the opening of his article. That is not a scientific term. That is a naked appeal to emotion and a tactic right out of “Rules for Radicals”.
Scientists don’t demonize their opponents. Politicians and demogogues do that. Scientists respond on the SCIENCE. The material at hand, and they do it with reason and supported arguments. And the adoption of these political terms by certain of the scientific community in this matter shows us what is happening: the politicization of science into “science activism”, an insidious perversion of scientific inquiry. It’s not just something “big oil” or “big pharma” or “big [insert conspiracy theory here]” does. In fact, most of these companies are far LESS guilty of this than the Greenpeace, save-the-world crowd.
In any case, on a material level this is what it basically breaks down to:
Agreement:
- Surface temperatures have increased since 1880
- Humans are adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere
- Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases have a warming effect on the planet
Disagreement:
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Whether the warming since 1950 has been dominated by human causes
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How much the planet will warm in the 21st century
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Whether warming is ‘dangerous’
a) How to globally define ‘dangerous’, which Meyer touched on: northern countries may well like longer growing seasons, have positive changes, etc.
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Whether we can afford to radically reduce CO2 emissions, and whether reduction will improve well-being
And scientists disagree because:
- Insufficient & inadequate observational evidence
- Disagreement about the value of different classes of evidence (e.g. global climate models)
- Disagreement about the appropriate logical framework for linking and assessing the evidence
- Assessments of areas of ambiguity & ignorance
- Belief polarization as a result of politicization of the science
It is worth noting that the last point is the most destructive force there is when trying to move towards a more perfect understanding of the problems and potential problems we face with climate science, measurement, and our changing climate. This polarization started in small nuclei and infected–on a widespread scale–first the laypeople and media, and then looped back to the scientists and academic crowd to complete the epidemic. We are now in a spot where it has metastasized.
It is also worth noting that even if the threat of catastrophic climate change is as bad as the most alarmist state, and the evidence is mounting that it is not, there are HUGE shortfalls in the proposed solutions from not only technological, but also economical, health and ethical standpoints. These shortfalls do not receive the attention they NEED because the debate has become a shouting match over a strawman and the political activists are screaming to “Do something!” without considering if it is even possible or beneficial (sound like any other debate you’ve heard of?).
NOTE: the bulleted lists here are Dr. Judith Curry’s, used in presentation, and used to describe the debate. Although I agree with them I did not come up with the phraseology. If I had done it it would have been more verbose lol.
NOTE 2: one thing Meyer overlooks is the wobbly and questionable nature of much of what is happening in the climate science sphere as a result of the politicization. That is beyond the ken of this post and his article, but you can look back at it (ClimateGate email scandal, FOIA blockages, manipulation of peer review process to stifle dissenting views, shitty statistics, non-compliance with journal regulations to make data freely available for criticism, delay of dataset release by 10 years, shoddy bookkeeping that can easily hide overt manipulation of data, etc etc). These are direct results of the political atmosphere that permeates the subject–they did not exist 25 years ago. None of them.
End Aragorn -
My main point in the other thread was to say that politicians and journalists often make some unmerited statements regarding data and what it means. I noticed you didn’t take any issue with Neumark’s point about the Obama White House’s use of the “no negative impact” assertion with relation to the minimum wage, or with the numbers regarding insurance and the ACA. I’m going to assume that you agree with me on those?