Dr. Roger Cohen, APS member, sends this via email commenting on this Dot Earth article.
Where do I start?
Well, maybe the most offensive part of this column is the use of psychobabble to distract and divert attention from the real issue, which is the science, and whether it has been corrupted. Of course Revkin will \”share Ropeik’s view.\” Would there be any doubt? This mumbo jumbo is a symptom of the burgeoning industry of treating global warming deniers as mentally ill, a stark reminder of how easy it was for the Soviet Union to throw dissenters into mental hospitals.
Am I exaggerating? Hardly. Take a look at this piece on a conference held in 2009 at the University of West England http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/6320/ . It was aimed at trying to understand just what affliction plagues those people who simply don’t see or can’t find the \”mountains of evidence\” for serious anthropogenic global warming. Evidently it has spawned a new field — \”ecopsychology.\” Lord help us.
As for the science, Lewis and many others who have bothered to actually look into it cannot find the purported strong case for serious anthropogenic global warming. Indeed the balance of evidence points to a small anthropogenic component, far smaller than IPCC summary conclusions. It will of course take time for this to be widely understood and broadly accepted, but it will. There will be a Kuhnian paradigm shift at some point. Meanwhile the tainted IPCC process and other shenanigans have caused public erosion in the trust it had invested in science and scientists. None of us know how this distrust, which is part of the larger decline of confidence in our key institutions, will resolve.
As for the APS and Dr. Lewis’s beef with it, readers may wish to review the information available at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/10/13/aps-responds-deconstructing-the-aps-response-to-dr-hal-lewis-resignation/ It sheds a bit more light on what is really going on.
Lazy know it all:
“And by the way I am not a physicist.”
Thanks for clearing that up.
I am a retired lawyer, earlier a chemical engineer. I have no expertise in global climate science, but I do have a fine-tuned sense of bullsh*t. And I have worked with PhD physicists, some of whom were not exactly free of bias toward the desired result. (Nothing to do with climate, but exemplary of the human being behind the degree).
I have been reading about the development of quantum physics way back in the twenties. Even Einstein had his bias toward classical physics. And there were a lot of disagreements among the investigators. I would say that the science is never settled, or we would have no quantum mechanics. Funny what a little “h” can do for you. (Plancks constant, for the civilians).
Lazy Teenager:
At October 15, 2010 at 2:38 pm you say;
“And by the way I am not a physicist.”
Obviously not from the nonsense with which you introduced that information.
Richard
Bill DiPuccio says:
October 15, 2010 at 2:21 pm
“Revkin is still under the mistaken impression that the uber-majority of scientists are proponents of the AGW-CO2 hypothesis. The ‘deniers’ are just a vocal fringe. But see “Six myths about “deniers”” in Quadrant Magazine.”
In addition, let us not forget that the academy lives under the heavy hand of “political correctness.” Very few on campus have the “balls of iron” to take on the PC crowd. For goodness sake, I bow to the god of “Diversity” daily. There is no way I would take it on. Doing so would bring nothing but grief. No doubt most scientists are unwilling to criticize the PC orthodoxy on AGW for the same reason. By the way, the PC crowd includes not just other academics but a whole host of individuals including the administrators.
From childhood, through my teens and into my 20’s, I held Scientists in the highest esteem. Since then my faith in the system has been slowly eroded to the position I find myself in now. That is to say (in eco-psychological terms), I am completely unable to accept or believe any assertion any scientist makes on any subject whatsoever. This is especially true if the assertion is made in the mainstream media, particularly by Geoffrey Lean (who has now dropped AGW as his subject de jure and started wittering on about how awful HCFC’s are).
Lazy Teenager
I am not a physicist either, but I do not have a closed mind. I have listened and read this warmist propaganda, since I was a teenager.
When you grow up, maybe you will open your mind, and understand when you are being manipulated by people trying to appeal to your values to suit their ends and means. Or maybe you won’t.
If you won’t learn, who will have won, you, or the psychologists? With their psychobabble, or yours?
Who needs Revkin? Oh yes, only when he gave no credence to the Rotten ice story… That’s not much to salvage.
What strikes me as irrational is that an intelligent person like
Dr. Lewis, myself and Andy Revkin who has devoted his professional life to science, would either pay no heed to, or dismiss, the mountains of scientific evidence, from neuroscience and psychology and economics and sociology, that demonstrates beyond any serious question that the way we perceive risk is affective… Our fears are a combination of the facts and how those facts feel.There you are, Ropeik, corrected.
Theo Godwin, there is a lot of evidence that our preconceptions can drastically alter what we perceive, it’s nothing to do with communist or right-wing or any political affinities – however, political extremists in all directions IMO suffer from hyperinflated preconceptions.
Tim Clark says: “…I’ve been much, much, worse than they think, but I’m better now.”
I hope you’re feeling robust.
All closed orthodoxies generate theories to explain why their critics are flawed or irrelevant. The word reprobate was originally a Calvinist term which meant ‘preordained to eternal damnation’. If you disagreed with Calvinism, well, that was the plainest evidence that you were reprobate; and who cares about the views of someone who is going to spend their eternity with Satan? Marxists believed that the historical process was an inevitable one, culminating in a proletarian state. Either you were on the side of history or you weren’t; and if you weren’t, you have no share in the future and your opinions were worthless anyway: into the ‘dustbin of history’ with you. Of course, the real experts on this were the Freudians. Freud himself was to assert that those who criticised his theory of the Oedipus complex were themselves repressing their own Oedipal feelings: the more strongly you argued against it, presumably, you more you proved Dr Freud right. Discussing your opponents views in terms of their ‘affect’ is the mark of a self-satisfied cult: the only differnce between them and the Scientologists is their better access to the media.
LazyTeenager says: “…And by the way I am not a physicist.”
We knew that.
@jim Brock:
Even QM is apparently in a quandary:
http://forum.hydrino.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=61&start=150#p1583
Back in the day, a single counterexample was all it took to disprove a theory, a person who constantly adjusted a theory to account for counterexamples was a crackpot, and a person who adjusted data to account for counterexamples was a fraud. It’s a shame that Dr. Lewis hasn’t been able to keep up with the advancements of modern science (sarcasm).
Lucy Skywalker says:
October 15, 2010 at 3:31 pm
“Theo Godwin, there is a lot of evidence that our preconceptions can drastically alter what we perceive…”
I believe that all that evidence is limited to parlor tricks. However, the crucial point is somewhat different. Is it the case that our ideas or beliefs cause our experiences to such a degree that possession of certain ideas or beliefs contribute causally to our experiences? The claim that I addressed is that Lewis’ fears caused a change in his experiences regarding climate change. Such views are the heart and soul of Marxism. Recall that the “new man” cannot be achieved/realized until the bonds of capitalism are broken; that is, the proletariat cannot accept communist ideology until they are freed from capitalism. After one such lecture, a friend of mine once quipped “If we are all so damned alienated, let’s go have a good time.”
heh, I was going to write about how the would post my comments, but apparently after a couple more they decided to post it……..here’s my take on Revkin’s hatchet job and what I posted in his comments section…..
Wow, Mr. Revkin actually moved the entire conversation from the antics of the APS(the stated reason for Dr. Lewis’ resignation) to the views behind Dr. Lewis’ conversion from alarmist to skeptic! Well played! I was under the mistaken impression that journalists reported rather than make news. Mr. Revkin, you are manufacturing the news. Did you even bother asking him about his petition? Or the by-laws governing the APS? How do you even make the jump to your article? 20y/o writings that were neither mentioned by Dr. Lewis nor the APS’s response nor in the deconstruction of the response by Drs Cohen, Happer and Lewis. Subtle advocacy at its best!
When a politician changes their mind it is called `flip flopping on the issues’ and is regarded as a sign of weakness. For a scientist the opposite is true. A scientist who looks at the evidence and changes their mind is evidencing that most important attribute that a scientists can possess, namely a mind that is open to be changed.
Ropeik [and Revkin]:
Our fears are a combination of the facts and how those facts feel.
Our brains are hard wired to do it this way.
Ropeik has trapped himself within his own schema: how does he know that he is not doing the same thing over and over again when he tries to escape this “hard wired” mechanism to try to evaluate what is a scientific fact or method?
Of course, Ropeik can speak for himself as to how his mind works. But, then again, according to his own posited mechanism, we can’t trust what he says as being related to reality, including what he says about himself.
Theo Goodwin: “The claim made in the ad hominem is itself an example of the worst kind of pseudo-science.”
Check the quote again: “It seems Dr. Lewis is demonstrating the very phenomenon he laments, letting his affect and worldviews interfere with taking all the reliable evidence into account…”
Ropeik is claiming that Lewis’s worldviews are influencing him to discount the evidence for global warming. Is this ad hominen? I’m not sure, but the notion of cognitive dissonanace is well understood.
As one commentator has put it: “The idea is that when presented with information that is dissonant from strong beliefs that people have invested in, the easiest way to deal with it is to ignore it, divert attention to something else, or simply avoid that type of information.”
Perhaps Revkin could explain why the late Stephen Schneider changed his views from global cooling to global warming: http://www.john-daly.com/schneidr.htm
Schneider S. & Rasool S., “Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide and Aerosols – Effects of Large Increases on Global Climate”, Science, vol.173, 9 July 1971, p.138-141
It is found that, although the addition of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere does increase the surface temperature, the rate of temperature increase diminishes with increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. (I think Lewis said that as well)
For aerosols, however, the net effect of increase in density is to reduce the surface temperature of Earth. Becuase of the exponential dependence of the backscattering, the rate of temperature decrease is augmented with increasing aerosol content.
An increase by only a factor of 4 in global aerosol background concentration may be sufficient to reduce the surface temperature by as much as 3.5 deg.K. If sustained over a period of several years, such a temperature decrease over the whole globe is believed to be sufficient to trigger an ice age.
“It is found that even an increase by a factor of 8 in the amount of CO2, which is highly unlikely in the next several thousand years, will produce an increase in the surface temperature of less than 2 deg. K.”
Lucy Skywalker,
Since the topic is rather important, I will try to be really clear. I might accept the claim that an eighteen year old male who lives in a highly patriarchal society does have his experiences of young women shaped somewhat by beliefs peculiar to his society. However, the important item here is the complexity of the context. The several contexts which must be investigated when we experiment on our young man are relatively simple and common to a lot of people. By contrast, if we are to experiment on Professor Lewis then the contexts become highly ramified, even supremely ramified. The reason is that the contexts in which Professor Lewis operates include his evolving understanding of some rather complicated physical theories and a whole bunch of related matters, such as a history of relevant experiments. Right away, our experimental psychologist hits a road block because he cannot understand these contexts. The experimental psychologist is unable to describe the interaction between Lewis’ evolving ideas and his experiences. Even if the psychologist could do so, what he would find is that Lewis’ set of ideas and their evolution are unique to Lewis, a matter that should not be surprising given Lewis’ achievements. Hence, if we discovered something about Lewis’ ideas, it could not be generalized to other thinkers. The discovery would necessarily belong to biography not science. In conclusion, productive scientists are geniuses in the true meaning of the word. In conclusion, I guess one can be a Marxist to the extent that a new social structure might influence the eighteen year old’s perception of young women. However, no social structure would impact the relationship between Lewis’ science and his experience.
Brendan H says:
October 15, 2010 at 5:12 pm
“Ropeik is claiming that Lewis’s worldviews are influencing him to discount the evidence for global warming. Is this ad hominen? I’m not sure, but the notion of cognitive dissonanace is well understood.”
The only folks in the world who continue to claim that a scientist’s “world view” shapes their experience of the evidence are the hardcore Marxists. Ropeik and Revnik know that, if they are not benighted Marxists. (Surely no intelligent person remains a Marxist.) For that reason, I take the claim to be psychobabble that is being used as a blunt instrument in an ad hominem.
A simple question. Why didn’t he have the cojones to send this to Revkin?
REPLY: You don’t know that he didn’t. I’ve sent three emails to Andy in the last week and have not had a single response. – Anthony
Ropeik has made an obvious blunder.
This is a science Blog, its got a wealth of nearly objective people, thats not an insult, its true all Humans are biased to a degree. What gives us impetus to act cogently, beyond the party tricks of the degenerate communist, is we know we can choose to defy our own bias.
This is no small feat.
This skill is available to us via the Scientific method, mostly missing amongst the political herd, hopefully it will resurface as a popular prerequisite to entry into adult life.
But given the deplorable state of education, its no small wonder that modern generations believe the PARTY line on what people are, and how they “SHOULD” behave.
Or worse how to “MAKE” them behave like trained seals, or demand their obedience at the end of a gun.
WUWT commentators tend to rebuke this trend, we can overcome cognitive dissonance, we can revise our position, we are NOT the PROLETARIAT, if ever there even was one.
So Ropeik is welcome to his belief, since thats all it is, we’ll stick with the certainty of the scientific method – over the dogma of politicized environmental agenda’s, which are merely poorly construed social engineering.
Hal Lewis has my greatest respect, if he’s biased at all, its in his refrain from righteously swearing is his resignation letter. Now that takes class.
Roger says:
October 15, 2010 at 1:44 pm
“Past studies give us insight into today’s debate dynamics. One study followed people who bought bomb shelters during the Cold War. It found that they tended to exaggerate the threat of nuclear war and to discount peace proposals, almost as if they were invested in nuclear war.”
I make one caveat: When you are dealing with totalitarian fascists (not nature), you must make sure that you really know and understand them. I remember reading in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, a sneering article pointing out the ridiculousness of the report that the Soviets were putting hermetic doors on the subway entrances so they could be used as air raid shelters. I personally saw them on deep subways in Moscow and other major or Republic Capitol cities. I personally knew a couple of people who came upon them in the closed (deployed) state in the wee hours and who were ID’d and warned to tell no one.
I also came into possession of an illustrated booklet that was given to Medical Doctors and certain Party Members, describing the steps to surviving a nuclear war. They believed that they could survive, and were prepared to do so. In 1958 to at least 1962, the Soviets were invested in nuclear war and ready to use it.
The current generation of young people making their way out into the world, in the midst of the current global economic disaster, clearly see that it is the result of elitists gaming the system to gain control before they get old and die.
The youth that grew up playing video games have as an understanding that there is always a game strategy, in the background programing that assists the player who figures it out, that every player has different skills they bring into the game formed by their preferred strategy. The level 72 white paladin, or level 23 troll axe wielder, as seen in every day blog quotes is just proof that these games are played in real life and not to be taken seriously.
Fit in at work, do what you can to get ahead, with out getting caught out by fudging up your social network. Extended social networks have come to be international in scope, new ideas flow through the interwoven WWW instantaneously, peers assist each other by advancing ideas that generate efficiency, bypassing old codgers with mental atherosclerosis as they do with the mindless drones in the backdrop of games who are not active players.
Politics as usual is a dead end game, with the agility of the truly mentally alert youth of today, that cannot be lied to with out causing very strong rebelling that results in the formation of “quests to root out evil in all of its forms”. The children of the elitists grow up knowing what it is all about, see the game from inside and will find their own “better form of game to play” rebellion from programing will play out in the formation of the “new elitist protegee” hopefully daddies money will be put to better uses in the near future.
Meanwhile real productive members of society will continue to strive to produce things as needed to fit into the entrepreneur class that sustains growth through innovation, that results in increased efficiency, and amassing real fortunes in technological breakthroughs, all the while aware that the background game is being played, and can be gamed for the advantage of those who understand how to play games.
There is no need to worry about the fates of the “helpless youth of today” who will bring this quagmire out into the light of the day, in a surge of rebellion against the elitist forces that have tried to run the “propaganda programs of scare and control game” while leaving them out of the real information loops by changing the data base they will need to work with. They already see it as just useless background pixels, put there to distract them from the real game of getting what they want out of life.
You would be surprised how many young professionals have come to value balance between work and leisure, social responsibility and realistic production, moral issues and commitment to quality in their own work and life styles. I am refreshed by the view I am getting of the attitude of the young, of not wasting time on non issues and getting on with real life, knowing there is a game afoot.