Climate Inquisition

I have been trying to really put into words in my head my feelings about this global warming radicalization.  Now I don't need to, this guy did it perfectly....  Are Solar Panels Really Black?

Here's the beginning of his piece:

One of the saddest things for me about climate science is how political it has become. Science works by having an open dialog that ultimately converges on the truth, for the common benefit of everyone. Most scientific fields enjoy this free flow of ideas.

There are serious scientific and technological issues in studying our climate, how it responds to human-caused emission of greenhouse gases, and what the most effective solutions will be for global warming. But unfortunately, the policy implications are vast and there is a lot at stake in economic terms.

It seems inevitable that discussions of climate science would degenerate to being deeply politicized and polarized. Depending on which views are adopted, individuals, industries, and countries will gain or lose, which provides ample motive. Once people with a strong political or ideological bent latch onto an issue, it becomes hard to have a reasonable discussion; once you’re in a political mode, the focus in the discussion changes. Everything becomes an attempt to protect territory. Evidence and logic becomes secondary, used when advantageous and discarded when expedient. What should be a rational debate becomes a personal and venal brawl. Rational, scientific debate that could advance the common good gets usurped by personal attacks and counterattacks.

Political movements always have extremists — bitterly partisan true believers who attack anybody they feel threatens their movement. I’m sure you know the type, because his main talent is making himself heard. He doesn’t bother with making thoughtful arguments; instead, his technique is about shrill attacks in all directions, throwing a lot of issues up and hoping that one will stick or that the audience becomes confused by the chaos. These folks can be found at the fringe of every political movement, throughout all of history. Technology has amplified them in recent years.

Comments

[Matthew G. Saroff]

While this guy sounds convincing, he's full of it.

In many areas in his book, the authors use contrarianism as an excuse to do sloppy and dishonest work.

It's not that they are evil, just that they want to sell books, and contrarianism sells books, even when it's incredibly wrong.

A good place to start is http://tinyurl.com/yhuma26 Brad Delong's posts on super Freakonomics, which link to a bunch of other authors.

This guy is upset because people called him out for being deliberately desceptive on global warming.

For example, he writes that Ken Caldeira says that "Carbon Dioxide is not the right villain."

Caldeira's response,
http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab/ "Carbon dioxide is the right villain, insofar as inanimate objects can be villains".

Also, he says that he does not support a global cooling theory when http://tinyurl.com/yjenanu global cooling is on the cover.

There is also their http://tinyurl.com/yfaj2lk lies about the consensus on a coming new ice age in the 1970s.

There was no consensus, but a small minority of climatologists who were unpersuasive.

[ShaMao]

Thanks for your comment. My reason for posting these links on climate change is not because I agree or disagree necessarily with the science involved. It is frankly beyond my knowledge of such things.

My point is that I definitely do not like the certainty that many of the climate activists seem to exhibit. The various inputs, outputs, and interactions involved are simply to complex I believe to warrant such certitude. In the absence of certainty, I am skeptical that the overall good of humanity is well served by denying the world's poor modernity.

[Matthew G. Saroff]

From the perspective of the LDCs, addressing CO2 emissions when you build the infrastructure will be on the order of 10x cheaper than retrofitting it later, so I think that it is a win for them.

The world's poor would do better, and do better faster, if we did not have an international trade/finance system that is colonialism with a local face.

As to the potential costs here, you have 4 outcomes which we can review on relative utility

Well, I come from the utility angle.

Either there is anthropogenic warming or there isn't.

Either we reduce C02 emmisions or we don't.

If there is not anthropogenic warming, and we do nothing, everyone wins, until we hit peak oil in 5-15 years, with the resulting economic shocks, wars, etc.

If there is no anthropogenic warming and we reduce CO2 emissions we spend a lot of money, but we reduce the inevitable shocks that come when we run out of oil.

If there is anthropogenic and we reduce emissions, we spend a lot of money, but we prevent the worst effects of climate change (see below) and we reducing the coming peak oil shocks.

If there is anthropogenic warming and we do nothing, we are looking at hundreds of millions of deaths and massive refugee flows as well as the peak oil shocks.

In terms of any cost/benefit analysis, you cut emissions.

[Matthew G. Saroff]

I suggest that you read the following (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/an-open-letter-to-steve-levitt/)

It's pretty clear that these guys did not do any homework at all on their claims.

The "waste heat" from solar cells is roughly equal to that generated by coal, and, the effects of C02 are over 100 times greater.

I'm not sure if this is revocation of tenure bad, but it's pretty bad.