Posted by Dee Norris
skep·tic
One who instinctively or habitually doubts, questions, or disagrees with assertions or generally accepted conclusions.
from Greek Skeptikos, from skeptesthai, to examine.
I have been reading a lot of the debates that inevitably follow any MSM story on Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW). In this story at the NewScientist, one of the comments stood out as a vivid example of the polarization that has developed between the those of us who are skeptical of AGW and those of us who believe in AGW.
By Luke
Fri Sep 12 19:15:22 BST 2008
The difference in response between skeptics and scientists is easily explained as the difference between inductive and deductive reasoning. Skeptics look for evidence to prove their conclusion and ignore any that does not fit what they believe. This makes it possible for them to believe in revealed religion and ignore anything that disputes it. I guess inductive reasoning can best be classified as deliberate ignorance. My condolences to practitioners of inductive thinking for your lack of logical ability. You don’t know what a pleasure it is to be able to think things through.
I was trained as a scientist from childhood. My parents recognized that I had a proclivity for the sciences from early childhood and encouraged me to explore the natural world. From this early start, I eventually went on to study Atmospheric Science back when global cooling was considered the big threat (actually the PDO had entered the warm phase several years earlier, but the scientific consensus had not caught up yet). One thing I learned along the way is that a good scientist is a skeptic. Good scientists examines things, they observe the world, then they try to explain why things behave as they do. Sometimes they get it right, somethings they don’t. Sometimes they get it as close as they can using the best available technologies.
I have been examining the drive to paint skeptics of AGW as non-scientists, as conservatives, as creationists and therefore as ignorant of the real science supporting AGW – ad hominem argument (against the man, rather than against his opinion or idea). Honestly, I have to admit that some skeptics are conservative, some do believe in creation and some lack the skills to fully appreciate the science behind AGW, then again I know agnostic liberals with a couple of college degrees who fully accept the theory of evolution and because they understand the science are skeptics of AGW. On the other hand, I have met a lot of AGW adherents who fully accept evolution, but have never read On The Origin of Species. Many of the outspoken believers in AGW are also dedicated foes of genetically modified organisms such as Golden Rice (which could prevent thousands of deaths due to Vitamin A deficiency in developing countries), yet they are unable to explain the significance of Gregor Mendel and the hybridization of the pea plant,
In his comment, Luke (the name has been changed to protect the innocent) attributes inductive reasoning to skeptics and deductive to scientists. Unfortunately, he has used inductive reasoning to draw general conclusions about skeptics based on his knowledge of a few individuals (or perhaps even none at all).
Skeptics are a necessary part of scientific discovery. We challenge the scientific consensus to create change. We examine the beliefs held by the consensus and express our doubts and questions. Skepticism prevents science from becoming morbid and frozen. Here are just a few of the more recent advances in science which initially challenged the consensus:
- The theory of continental drift was soundly rejected by most geologists until indisputable evidence and an acceptable mechanism was presented after 50 years of rejection.
- The theory of symbiogenesis was initially rejected by biologists but now generally accepted.
- the theory of punctuated equilibria is still debated but becoming more accepted in evolutionary theory.
- The theory of prions – the proteinaceous particles causing transmissible spongiform encephalopathy diseases such as Mad Cow Disease – was rejected because pathogenicity was believed to depend on nucleic acids now widely accepted due to accumulating evidence.
- The theory of Helicobacter pylori as the cause of stomach ulcers and was widely rejected by the medical community believing that no bacterium could survive for long in the acidic environment of the stomach.
As of today, the Global Warming Petition Project has collected over 31,000 signatures on paper from individuals with science-related college or advanced degrees who are skeptical of AGW. Someone needs to tell the AGW world that’s thirty-one thousand science-trained individuals who thought things through and became skeptics.
It was Cassandra who foretold the fall of mighty Troy using a gift of prophecy bestowed upon her by Apollo, Greek god of the Sun. So it would seem fitting that I assume her demeanor for just one brief moment –
- The theory of anthropogenic carbon dioxide as the cause of the latter 20th century warm period was widely accepted by the scientific consensus until it was falsified by protracted global cooling due to reductions in total solar irradiance and the solar magnetic field.
I am a skeptic and I am damn proud of it.
[The opinions expressed in this post are that of the author, Dee Norris, and not necessarily those of the owner of Watts Up With That?, Anthony Watts, who graciously allows me to pontificate here.]
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Here’s my thinking.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2008/08/24/what-a-global-warming-skeptic-believes
The commentor should take a lesson on science. All scientific theory is based off of inductive logic. The only way to gather information about the natural world is inductively. Of course, bad information/opinions are more common than good ones on both sides of this issue. I’m not sure why but, debates on AGW are excellent for exposing people for knowing very little about science.
Dee Norris, I fully agree with you.
I am a SKEPTIC
Dee Norris, I liked your post. It was smart. If you’re at all interested in the philosophical etymology of skepticism, give this a click (moderator permitting, of course):
http://www.the-thinking-man.com/cynic-versus-skeptic.html
I’m asked this question more and more, so I thought I’d do a short article on it.
Induction, far from being inferior to deduction, is the very locus of conceptualization.
I’m not. So many people still believe in silly things regardless of centuries of falsification of said things. People never seem to need evidence, just someone to yell it to them loudly enough.
Dee your article was great but there is a pervasive problem where the AGW dogmatists do not want to debate the science but tell skeptics that the science is finished along with name calling e.g., traitors. This appears to be a major impediment in making progress in the debate as the news media usually reports in lockstep with the AGW crowd. Unfortunately even a drastic cooling may not provide sufficient evidence of corrupt science but only be categorized as a temporary incremental climate change. The eventual tipping point may not be of scientific origin but from public protests to burdensome regulations with their associated costs.
Brendan H (17:56:14)
“Currently, AGW is gaining mainstream acceptance against rejection by sceptics, just as in the examples above.” Please describe the mainstream besides tabloid journalism, politicians seeking power, and corporation’s financial benefits.
a reminder that temperature is not easy to measure:
http://www.capgo.com/Resources/Temperature/TempHome/TempMeasurement.html
another reminder that no attempt to determine error in the measurements is made, neither by season or by latitude or by type of station:
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcrut3/HadCRUT3_accepted.pdf
counters (17:44:05) :
Frankly I am skeptical of any operational meteorologist who can determine average accurate historical global surface temperatures and take a giant leap to make accurate climate change conclusions. Like someone said you might as well take the average of numbers in a telephone book.
Ok, all you mathematicians and economists, let me try this line of reasoning out, because I really do want to know where I have gone wrong – otherwise I can’t advance my understanding of our energy situation:
Exxon-Mobile recently listed its much balleyhooed [pre tax] profits of
$12-13 billion for its quarter, which amounted to a little less than 10% profit over expenses. So, what is 10% of $4.00/gal. gas? A mere 40 cents, right? So how can “Big Oil” be blamed for the high price of gas? Especially in light of the fact that here in Oregon, for example, State and Federal gas taxes amount to about 42 cents per gallon, and this has been the case even before gas went from $1.80 to just below $4.00 per gallon, as it now stands where I live.
Please, tell me where I have gone wrong. I want to know.
My biggest problem with the skeptic community is that, in my opinion, they preach a double-standard. While many skeptics take a hard-line, skeptical attitude towards all aspects of it – theory, evidence, and predictions – they take any contrary theory, evidence, or predictions on faith.
Sure. Almost everyone has a dog in the fight. That’s exactly why open data and methods are so critical.
Scientists (advocates, critics, and the whole damn species) are human beings and have all the attendant fallacies thereof. That is why the scientific method exists.
If we were E.E. “Doc” Smith’s Arisians, we wouldn’t need scientific method. Arisians are without petty egoism. We wouldn’t need to show our hands after a poker hand, either–Arisians are scrupulously honest.
But here we are. With all the fallibilities you indicate. Hence, the need, nay, the absolute requirement, for openness.
One of the main reasons I am a skeptic is that the skeptical scientists fall all over themselves to make their data available, whereas the IPCC and the hockey team refuse to cough up their data absent the prospect of a subpoena.
Sorry. If the gentleman to the left doesn’t show his cards, I shall not permit him to claim the pot. Character references of his “peers” notwithstanding.
Nor will showing me a few cards left in the deck that are not inconsistent with the hand he claims do, either.
So sorry. Cards, please. And the right to check out the deck. Nothing less will do.
Reply – I was wondering when someone would make the leap from deductive reason to abductive reasoning. Abductive is prone to generating false results, more so than either deductive or inductive, but it has its uses for narrowing the field of outcomes. – Dee Norris
Thanks for the reply. It’s not so much a leap as recognition of reality. BTW, I assume you meant inductive (vs. deductive) reasoning as science normally proceeds from a few known facts to general rule.
Yes, assigning false cause is a possible outcome; that’s why 1) it’s only the starting point and 2) it’s necessary to test hypotheses, preferable through experimentation.
Abduction is the method of choice in medical diagnosis. It’s the first step in forming any hypothesis whether or not it’s done subconsciously. And it is the methodology used when eliminating some hypotheses out-of-hand, especially if the justification is “not a probably cause.”
Inductive inference, i.e., assigning a cause through pure logic (assuming that’s really possible), is extremely rare outside of well understood circumstances. Even something as simple as answering why the ground turned white, perhaps by saying “probably it snowed,” automatically rejects the possibility of other causes (say volcanic ash layering) because of perceived (low) probability of these causes — assuming they would ever occur to most people at all.
I recommend the book “Learning Bayesian Networks” by Richard E. Neapolitan, Prentice Hall, ISBN 0-13-012534-2 for a good description of a computational process for abductive inference. Not the most definitive work but it is the one most easily read.
Note: in logic class something like “Every crow I’ve encountered is black; therefore all crows are black” is trotted out as an example of induction. Well, it is but I focused on causes because I think most scientific endeavors are more akin to asking the question “Why is this bird black?” and getting a list: “Because it’s a crow; because it was swimming in an oil spill; …” The list may be arrived at inductively but, unless one has unlimited resources, any resulting investigation involving the list is going to be pared through abduction (which I maintain makes the whole process abductive).
Reply – That would be ‘Luke’ who got it backwards, not me. It was one of the reasons the comment stood out at me when I first read it. – Dee Norris
Take it from an insider: we all know that it has huge issues. Mr. Watts’ SurfaceStations project is nothing new – anyone who has spent ten minutes dealing with climate data knows about these issues. While documenting all the issues will help clean up the records, the problem is not that we don’t know about them. The problems are systematic, and as such, are dealt with as efficiently and pragmatically as possible.
So why do comparisons between the raw and adjusted data not show the differences that the NOAA/CRN standards indicate?
And if surfacestation issues are so well accounted for, how in holy heck is SHAP a POSITIVE adjustment?
And why is UHI adjustment a measly -0.1 degree Farenheit?
And why doesn’t the USHCN-2 not show in a clean, concise graph the exact amount of each adjustment step? (Could it just maybe be the absolute firestorm that erupted when the this was made available for USHCN-1?)
Enquiring minds want to know.
I think that those of you “on the inside” need to press a little harder on the parameters of the “possible”.
Reply – That would be ‘Luke’ who got it backwards, not me.
OK, I guess what caused my “BTW..” comment was your: ” was wondering when someone would make the leap from deductive reason to abductive reasoning” as I made no such leap (at least I don’t think I did). I wasn’t implying you got anything essentially wrong.
Interesting discussion.
I think every investigation proceeds using abduction if only to narrow the search. My original point is that regardless of the conclusion (pro vs. con), both sides got there by the same process (abduction) but have assigned different subjective probabilities to the various causes and this alone is the reason for the differing beliefs. Both sides would make more progress IMO if they recognized this.
Reply – I guess my wording was confusing. I was considering on adding a follow up on abductive reasoning (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abductive_reasoning), but was pleased that you beat me to the punch. – Dee Norris
So far, I have no idea what “abductive” reasoning is. Imo, it’s as useless a concept as “inductive” or “deductive” reasoning is: to wit, what you need to do is to keep responsive to changing conditions, which always happen. This presupposes, of course, that you want to do the right thing – which means to me treating everyone as you would treat yourself, at least in my Fairy Tale. The outcome is the main thing. In medicine, you are really only as good as your next case. That keeps it lively.
I’m completly sceptical that CO2 induced global warming will cause “global cooling” and associated “Climate Chaos” which seems to be the coming AGW mantra…
BTW – following the same lingusitic logic of the AGW Climate Chaos camp – I’m also willing to be sceptical of the following points (by analogy).
1. That growing older makes you younger…
2. That growing fatter makes you thinner…
3. That earning more makes you poorer…
4. That earning less makes you richer…
5. etc, etc, etc,….
Once you accept the “logic” that CO2 induced Global Warming causes “Climate Chaos!” including Global Cooling – Then any effect can be linked to any cause – even a contradictory one.
I actually put AGW’s constant morphing in the face of contradictory evidence down to Cognitive Dissonance…
The typical AGW believer is so heavily emotionally invested in the idea that AGW is true and correct and that they must save the world (oh the significance of it all…) that contrary evidence must be accomodated (Climate Chaos!), denigrated (ad-hom, etc) or ignored (MSM Silence, Climate Consensus, etc).
At no point does logic or scepticism intrude. Even the use of the most basic logic in an honest way would reveal the internal contradictions of the current AGW Climate Chaos mantra.
At least when the AGW camp only predicted “global warming” they were at least “somewhat falsifiable” – now that the world is refusing to warm while CO2 continues to be pumped into the atmosphere.
So the AGW believers have a choice. Give up on the theory – or change the theory. The main response, as reported, in the MSM seems to be to mod the theory to predict everything – warming, cooling, etc. Of course the AGW theory then becomes pseudoscientific junk as it is no longer falsifiable.
So far, I have no idea what “abductive” reasoning is.
Deductive:
Each time the earth rotates, the sun rises.
The earth rotates once a day.
Therefore the sun will rise tomorrow.
Inductive:
The sun rose yesterday.
The sun rose the day before that.
(Rinse and repeat.)
Therefore the sun will rise tomorrow.
Abductive:
I worship the sun every evening.
The sun rises every morning.
Therefore, the sun rises because I worshiped it the evening before.
But it’s not a useless concept.
WRT the comparision of Darwinisim and AGW:
The proponents of Darwinisim are not seeking to increase the cost of energy through CAP and Trade systems, taxes, etc, Nor are they seeking to place intrusive controls on my lifestyle choices.. Nor are Darwinists seeking to subsidise (Taxes again) economically inefficient industries like Bio-Fuels that directly remove food from the world markets driving up prices for the worlds poor…
etc, etc…
I think the impacts are obviously different – looks like Darwinism is not a heavily politicised theory.
We have before us a grand opportunity, skeptic or not. We are presented with potentially a unique circumstance of a solar grand minimum. What are the tests that we would like to be sure are run. How should they be quantified. How do we frame those tests. Certainly temperature. Certainly Polar ice. What else? Even though the temperature and ice are being watched it is in the framing of AGW. In the online realtime world everything is questioned all is documented and the results are reviewed continuously to see if further tests and or ideas can be put to test. There is no winner or loser only data to be reviewed and understood.
evan, that is truely a useless concept. I think you intended it, you abjectively abductive thinker, you. I like Dav’s ideas, but what the hell is he talking about in this case? Not that I really care.
Reply – Abductive reasoning allows us to eliminate what we know is wrong, leaving a set of possible answers which includes the correct answer and one or more incorrect answers. Further testing can eliminate the remaining incorrect answers. – Dee Norris
We correlate temperatures with every solar measurement we can.
And ice. And humidity. And cloud cover. And sea level. And the multidecadal oceanic-atmospheric cycles.
And hope our abductive reasoning heads us in the right direction!
WRT to energy companies and AGW – I have not seen one that does not state in advertisements that they are “Protecting the environment” and guess who has their hands out to diversify into tax payer funded windmill farms…
Windmills are great for energy companies.– You have to keep you original baseload power generation operating plus you get a guaranteed profit from the windmills due to tax breaks and subsidisation.
Guess who pays, the tax payer and the end consumer. Any AGW proponent who thinks that big oil and the energy companies are naturally against AGW is a fool.
These companies exist to make a profit, selling oil, gas, coal, electricity is just something they do – and they are not attached to the specific things that they do to make a profit. If the Govt promises subsidies they will line up for the money.
AGW is money for jam for the energy companies.
Very nicely written piece Miss Norris and lovely frock (oh, I’d better not go there).
This has been a fun thread to read because it sheds light on the attitudes of people much more than on science. As a reader of blogs on both side of the debate (that is the debate that St Al of Gore tells us is over, except that it isn’t) it is noticeable that comments follow the same pattern when an “opponent” comes in for a chat.
He pops in from the other side of the fence and says he supports X’s bit of research or Y’s opinion and is beset by dozens telling him (sometimes politely, sometimes not) that he has the mental capacity of a woodlouse and simply does not understand what would be obvious to anyone with the brainpower required to breath.
Our new friend Mr Dan must think us either very rude or very stupid (or both) when we pooh-pooh his assertion that the hockey stick graph has been proved valid after all. I hope we are neither rude nor stupid. I hope we are just approaching the issue of the hockey stick graph from a different perspective than his own.
My inference from his contribution at (08:44:25) is that he is thrilled to see the hockey stick supported. It is hard to see any rational basis on which someone would have a desire for a particular pattern of historical global temperatures to be validated for its own sake, so my further inference is that he is not thrilled by the hockey stick itself as by the conclusions drawn by the IPCC in reliance on the hockey stick – conclusions which would (it seems to me) be necessarily invalid if the hockey stick itself were not valid. Those conclusions could, of course, be valid in themselves for reasons as yet undiscovered but their current validity rests on the validity of the hockey stick.
In other words, I infer that his support for the hockey stick is based on his pleasure at the IPCC’s conclusions. It is, therefore, his desire to see the IPCC’s conclusions being supported that causes him to post a comment of joy about the new hockey stick.
I approach the hockey stick issue from a different perspective. The first hockey stick having been given a bit of a slapping (no pun intended), I look at any further work of its manufacturer with a jaundiced eye. If he got the first one badly wrong, I see no reason why I should trust his second attempt. After all, if I employ someone to do a job and he gets it badly wrong I would be more than a little reluctant to employ him to sort out the mess.
So, when I read Mr Dan’s comment that a new and unimpeachable hockey stick has been created by the man who built the warped and ineffective one I am reluctant to accept the new product. The vital thing in the argument is that neither Mr Dan nor I is able to say with authority that the new hockey stick is or is not valid. Mr Dan says it is because he wants the conclusions that flow from it to be upheld, I say I cannot be satisfied because the manufacturer has a bit of a dodgy record in this field.
(In fact, no doubt like most readers here, I was already aware of the new hockey stick and of the trenchant criticisms that have been made of its method of manufacture, but that is neither here nor there.)
I am weak on the cloud cover documentation. World wide satellite correlation? Day night differentials? Are these hooked to the cosmic particle index. Is that mapped by a global index? There are so many areas of interest, I my experience parceling is required. No one person can hold all the facts. So far it does not seem that NOAA or NASA have anything but AGW in their agenda, so it seems maybe science of the Blogs.
Abductive reasoning allows us to eliminate what we know is wrong, leaving a set of possible answers which includes the correct answer and one or more incorrect answers. Further testing can eliminate the remaining incorrect answers. – Dee Norris
Back in the day, we used to call that “thinking”. What I’m criticizing is the formulaic approach to “thinking” – imo, this tact can’t possibly work, which seems to be well-proven by current “science”. If no one follows the rules, and insistenly so, how can it possibly work, whether it’s deductive, inductive, abductive, or anything else we might try to impose? No, we are in a war with some very inferior hominids. They will not be defeated simply because we formulate some rules or state some words.