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.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
JPeden says:
October 15, 2010 at 4:42 pm
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.
—————
JPeden,
Exactly. His theory dismisses his own ability to have knowledge that he professes.
He self-refutes.
In academia you can often find people supporting these kinds of intellectual dead-ends.
The only way out of his position is to claim he has special knowledge that comes from a source that is not available to others. : ) Does he receive radio stations inside his head? To stop him from receiving those stations it is tin foil hat time for old Ropeik.
Andy Revkin acts like he also has special knowledge not available to independent thinkers (a.k.a. skeptics). We can get him a tin foil hat too . . . . . in would be the humane thing to do.
John
Richard M says:
October 16, 2010 at 7:57 am
“1) Accepted AGW but never really looked at it.
2) Bought into AGW and became a pro-active proponent.
3) Never accepted or bought into AGW.”
Interesting suggestion, Richard. Add a fourth group, the “highly scrupulous sceptic” is someone who, over a period of years, searched extensively for well-confirmed physical hypotheses that can be used to explain and predict some of the various climate phenomena that serious warming supposedly brings about – but found nothing.
An eminent highly scrupulous sceptic is Roy Spencer whose book “The Great Climate Warming Blunder” sets forth exactly my experience in searching for the hypotheses and evidence that a science of AGW must produce. He, too, could not find the hypotheses or evidence.
John Whitman writes:
“The only way out of his position is to claim he has special knowledge that comes from a source that is not available to others. : ) Does he receive radio stations inside his head? To stop him from receiving those stations it is tin foil hat time for old Ropeik.”
Lenin and Trotsky invented the “Avant Garde” just for the purpose of revealing this special knowledge to the plebes. Of course, the plebes had to wait, watch, and then sacrifice while the Avant Garde bumbled through its revelations. Sheesh. Comic Book stuff.
Robert E. Phelan says:
October 16, 2010 at 10:26 am
You departed from science and scientific method to take up religion. Life is not long enough for me to address that topic change.
James Sexton says:
October 16, 2010 at 7:42 am
Ahh, I thought you had caught my misspelling of “imbued”. Thank you for the kind review, but I have to acknowledge that I’m just standing on the shoulders of giants. Now, if I could just get Theo Goodwin to acknowledge that the work of Galileo and Newton were not “sui generis” but rather, giant geniuses that they were, the questions that they answered and the methods they used were conditioned by the work of geniuses before them. If the questions had been different, the mathematics would have been different.
Theo Goodwin says:
October 16, 2010 at 9:20 am
Theo, we seem to be cross-posting. I thought that in answering Jack Simmons later post you were ignoring mine, but apparently you are using the same methodology wrt long threads that I do, starting from the bottom up. There are a number of points you’ve raised that I’d like to address, but you may have additional thoughts and want to respond to my latest… so I’ll hold off, for now.
Revkin has a very good point:
AGW hypothesis is based on psycological evidence
“psychological”
————–
Lucy Skywalker,
Sorry I am picking up so late on a very early comment of yours on this thread. I see there are quite a few responses to your comment.
Of course humans are social animals. Of course we are nutured and educated and socialized for nigh on 18 to 22 yrs (or more).
It is one thing to say there are humans that do not ever escape, either partially or entirely, from their upbringing and education. It is obvious there are many in this situation.
It is completely another thing to say human beings as human beings cannot achieve significant or complete total independence of their upbringing and education; that is to say it is impossible to re-examination everything, emphasis on everything, with their critical reason capacity. That view would be cultural/social subjectivism. It denies the ability of man as man to obtain objectivity.
There is a fundamental error that dead-ends cultural/social subjectivism. If it is true then the theory itself is just a subjective statement of a subjective person embedded in the matrix of cultural/social subjectivism itself. Empty content.
For someone to claim the objective existence (validity) of cultural/social subjectivism then they would have to claim some special/privileged capability or knowledge source that elevates them above the subjective to the objective. If they can do it then of course it refutes subjectivism as a necessity. Anyone in principle could also do it. Also, well . . . . . we know where the road leads when people start to claim they are the recipients of special/privileged knowledge not available to others . . . .
It (cultural/social subjectivism) self-refutes. It is empty of content.
John
This Forbes piece on the skeptics’ position is well worth reading. Well constructed and readily understood, without a huge technical “overhead:”
http://blogs.forbes.com/warrenmeyer/2010/10/15/denying-the-catstrophe-the-science-of-the-climate-skeptics-position/?boxes=opinionschannellatest
John Whitman says:
October 16, 2010 at 11:40 am
It is completely another thing to say human beings as human beings cannot achieve significant or complete total independence of their upbringing and education; that is to say it is impossible to re-examination everything, emphasis on everything, with their critical reason capacity. That view would be cultural/social subjectivism. It denies the ability of man as man to obtain objectivity.
Hmm. I would stick with “significant” and avoid “complete”, and this, for a certain value of objectivity.
I happen to be multilingual, from a young age. Languages color perception, believe me, and perception is how one builds the analogue of the world for the mind.
I have also traveled enough.
Can the objectivity reached by a Japanese person be the same as that reached by a Greek? Not talking about science and mathematics. On social and cultural issues I think not. I would appreciate the objective world of a corresponding Japanese Anna, but it would be a different world.
Vive la difference
—————–
anna v,
Well going run off the watch the NYY play TexR in game two of the ALCS. : ) GO YANKEES!!
Thank you for your comment.
Yes, I understand your view. My whole professional life has been international business mostly in Asia and fair amount in Europe, quite a bit in Japan. Going to Japan again on business trip in a couple of weeks. : ) Also, I was raised early on mostly by my Polish mother who spoke no english . . . . my father working most of the time I was awake . . . . this happened in a small New England town . . . culture shock. My daughter was raised fully bilingual in Chinese and English.
My experience was that communicating the scientific analysis, technical issues and complex system design was very easy to do with the Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Swedes, Spanish, and Mexicans . . . . I saw no difference in any culture’s ability to see what I was seeing in these areas.
But, and it is a large but, the thinking processes involved in managing or deciding anything was not necessarily the same as my Amercian culture’s way. We knew this by using the knowledge of very experienced older businessmen who deal in the various cultures. So, it was a kind of objective knowledge of the differences in the processes of culturess. Very few problems.
People are different within cultures and across cultures, but still human and as humans share a capacity to reason; its application processes might vary. I see no evidence that the capacity isn’t the same for different cultures.
John
Robert E. Phelan says:
October 16, 2010 at 11:32 am
If I had more time, I would address your questions. I believe that modern science, meaning science informed by an understanding of scientific method, is a product of Galileo. Yes, the young Galileo was presented with the science of his time, but he overcame it entirely. Over the next few days, I might be able to get back to your questions.
DaveF says:
October 16, 2010 at 3:31 am
Andrew P 15th Oct 11:01:
You mention a post-war debate in the UK parliament where the dropping of nuclear bombs on the USSR was discussed. Could you give a date or other details of this debate, please? I should like to look it up for myself. Thanks, Dave.
Dave, I am not sure of the date, and am not a historian nor voracious reader, so am fairly sure that my memory of this will come from a Time Watch or a similar television documentary series made by the BBC in the 1980s (when they still made excellent programmes). I have had a quick google and can’t find any mention of it, but did come across http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Unthinkable which sets the context. There’s a couple of references at the foot of the wiki page which should be useful.
Theo Goodwin says:
October 16, 2010 at 8:57 am
Andrew P writes:
“Yes, I am sure they were, but they had good reason to; just after WW2 there was a very serious debate in the UK parliament about whether we should drop nuclear bombs on Moscow lest they became a military threat. So Stalin and Krushchev had good reason to be paranoid, and would have been remiss of them to not develop their bomb and seek ways to protect their populations from the all to real threat posed by the west.”
Artful try, Andrew. Now give yourself a real challenge. Explain the paranoia that built the Berlin Wall.
Theo, that’s easy. The Soviet empire was run by a succession of totalitarian dictators, who became increasingly paranoid when it became all too apparent that the communist system didn’t work very well. Just because I defend the Russian’s right to develop nuclear arms, does not mean I agree with everything else they stood for. But had the Russians not developed their own ICBMs its odds on that the crazies in the Pentagon would have launched a pre-emptive strike many years ago, and killed millions of innocent civilians throughout Europe. All in the name of democracy and freedom of course.
Robert E. Phelan
If the questions had been different, the mathematics would have been different.>>
Obsolutely not. The evolution might have been different, but the conclusions would have been identical in the end. 2+2 is 4 in any system developed by any culture anywhere in the world at any time in history. The same is true for a complex binomial or a first order differential. Only the symbols differ. Once translated, the math is identical.
Only the decisions made in regard to the results differ from one culture to another.
Andrew P.
But had the Russians not developed their own ICBMs its odds on that the crazies in the Pentagon would have launched a pre-emptive strike many years ago, and killed millions of innocent civilians throughout Europe. All in the name of democracy and freedom of course.>>
What a bizarre statement. The west had plenty of time to launch a nuclear attack on Russia when they had the bomb and the Russians didn’t, when they had long range bombers and the Russians didn’t, and when they had ICBM’s and the Russians didn’t. But they didn’t.
I recall also that during the cold war America rebuilt the economies of allies and defeated enemies alike. It was the Russians whose policy was seize, hold and suppress. While Japan was being rebuilt with American money after their defeat, becoming a democracy and ally in the process, communist troops were going house to house in the Ukraine and confiscating all the food resulting in starvation of 8 million people.
Your rewrite of history is both bizarre and sad.
@ur momisugly Davidmhoffer.
I didn’t say the west did launch an attack on the Russians. Just that they/we considered it. As I said I don’t and won’t begin to defend the oppression/suppression of the people in the Soviet era. What I don’t buy is that the west was a totally innocent party in the cold war. And its not my re-write of history, it’s called revisionism. As for the Marshall Plan, yes, great for Germany and Japan, but the UK got nothing out of it because we voted for a Labour government, which was too ‘socialist’ for the USA’s liking. Instead we had severe rationing until the 195os. Poverty and housing conditions in Glasgow were still so bad in the 50’s that it was not uncommon for babies to be brought into hospitals with no lips – because they had been eaten by rats. So please don’t tell me that America rebuilt our economy, when the reality is that the UK only paid off the last of our war debt to the USA in 2006.
Viv Evans: “It is not about Hal Lewis having or not having a ‘big idea’ about climate.”
I was pointing to the absurdity of the comparison with Martin Luther.
This issue is about publicity for the climate sceptics’ cause. The aim is to use the resignation of Prof Lewis from the APS to garner maximum publicity for his views on AGW.
To achieve that publicity, the spokeperson needs to be credible, to have some expertise and experience in the issue in question. Being “eminent” isn’t enough.
That’s why the resignation isn’t getting much traction in the mainstream media. It’s not bias, it’s relevance, or more accurately, the lack of it.
This failure to generate much publicity also inadvertently highlights another issue: the paucity of “big names” in climate science who bat for the sceptic side. If Lewis is regarded as a big hitter, then, no matter how worthy he may be professionally and personally, the pool of talent is rather thin.
davidhoffer: “When a towering intellect with his credentials speaks in this manner and the best his critics can come up with is that he has published no thesis of his own…”
When criticism is reduced to the likes of “global warming scam” and “pseudoscientific fraud”, you know that the manner of speaking owes nothing to a “towering intellect”.
“I’ve driven over the horizon…”
The horizon is always receding.
Andrew P. says:
October 16, 2010 at 1:29 pm
“…………………………………….
But had the Russians not developed their own ICBMs its odds on that the crazies in the Pentagon would have launched a pre-emptive strike many years ago, and killed millions of innocent civilians throughout Europe. All in the name of democracy and freedom of course.”
========================================================
What an absolute ridiculously absurd, reality denying assertion.
You mean like we did when we nuked Korea? Or Vietnam? Or how about our other rivals China? Cuba? Iran? Iraq? Sorry, your ludicrous stereo-type of people in uniform doesn’t meet with historical reality.
” On the contrary, the soldier above all other people prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.”—— General Douglas MacArthur——- Duty, Honor, Country speech.
If you or anyone else wish to gain insight to the character of the people in uniform of this nation. Read this text in its entirety. Its a beautiful read. I can’t get through it without tearing up, but its probably my background. Mid-way through the speech, he’s got some wonderful prognostications.
http://www.keytlaw.com/Greatwords/macarthur.htm
davidmhoffer says:
October 16, 2010 at 1:55 pm
First, let me start off by admitting that I am severly math challenged and have no idea of what an alternative mathematics would look like or whether it would yield results equivalent to what we know. I just ask you to consider this: all systems of mathematics start with assumptions. The mathematical conception of zero has no counterpart in the phenomenological world and may have originated in the cosmological / philosophical speculations of either the Chinese or the Indians who posited a “void”, a nothingness, that when applied to mathematics and mathematical descriptions of observed reality (a reality filtered through a cultural lens) proved amazingly useful. Zero, a concept that may well have spread by diffusion rather than by independent discovery (well, maybe the Mayans…. I never accepted Von Daniken’s alien intervention explanation) is accepted by definition rather than by empirical observation. It is a postulate, but it has been shown to be so amazingly useful that we accept it as a law of nature. Now imagine a mathematics that had both positive and negative numbers but no conception of zero. What would it look like? What would our conception of science look like? Our conception of reality?
Newton (and Liebnitz) developed a system of mathematics designed to answer the questions they (were both) interested in and which yielded results that corresponded to the phenomenological world they inhabitated. I stand by my assertion: if the questions were different, the math would be different. I can’t judge whether the results would be different…. but I offer for your consideration the country boy IQ test:
There are five birds sitting on a branch. You shoot one bird. How many are left? The city-slicker boy says “That’s easy. Five birds less one is four.” The country boy says “huh, what makes you think birds are so dumb they’ll stick around after a gun-shot?”
Context is everything.
Robert E. Phelan;
Now imagine a mathematics that had both positive and negative numbers but no conception of zero. What would it look like?>>
Well it would look like Roman Numerals as one example. They can be used to do the precise same calculations and they arrive at the precise same answers. Ancient Rome built roads, bridges, aquaducts and all manner of major construction. They determined maximum loads and spans, determined weight distribution of a loaded arch, gradients for major water systems, and other highly complex mathematical calculations, arriving at precisely the same answers as a modern engineer would. The ancient Greeks before them had a zero, but it wasn’t integral to calculations it was more of a place holder for numbers with multiple decimal places. Despite this they were able to calculate the circumfrance of the earth very accurately as well as disctance from the Sun. In fact, they calculated the amount of energy stored in various materials through experimentation, and concluded that the output of the Sun far exceeded the amount of energy that could be stored in flammable materials. They theorized that matter must be composed of some sort of particles too small for the human eye to see, and that energy was stored in some manner in those particles, which is precisely the case.
Your admission that you are not strong in math is upheld by your analysis of it.
Andrew P.;
I didn’t say the west did launch an attack on the Russians. Just that they/we considered it.>>
How quickly we forget our own words, despite them being recorded above in this thread for all to see and easily reference. You said, and I quote:
” But had the Russians not developed their own ICBMs its odds on that the crazies in the Pentagon would have launched a pre-emptive strike many years ago, and killed millions of innocent civilians throughout Europe.”
Your words and intent are clear. You implied that Russian ICBM’s were the deterrent that prevented the “crazies in the Pentagon” from launching a nuclear attack. I demonstrated the complete falsehood of your statement, and you retreat to the position that what you meant was that they considered it which is an entirely different matter. If you are going to make inflammatory statements be prepared to defend them or admit you are in error. Attempting to reframe what you clearly said as something else entirely does little for your credibility and even less for the debate itself.
Brendan H.;
When criticism is reduced to the likes of “global warming scam” and “pseudoscientific fraud”, you know that the manner of speaking owes nothing to a “towering intellect”.>>
Were you to read and understand his letter in its entirety, it would become obvious to you that “global warming scam” and “pseudoscientific fraud” were not his criticisms at all. They were conclusions drawn from his criticisms which were well laid out and easily verified. My expectation is that you have, in fact, read his letter in its entirety, and deliberately choose to quote him out of context in order to create the perception that his criticisms are not well founded or articulated when in fact they are. This is precisely the manipulative and disengenuous behaviour that Dr Lewis protests in detail in his letter of resignation. Sad that even valid criticism is so ruthlessly attacked by immoral means in order to advance a political agenda.
The horizon by the way, does not always recede, contrary to your claim. For the explorer intent on sailing west to get to the east, the horizon recedes. For the observer secure in their knowledge that the earth is flat, standing on the dock and watching, the evidence is clear. Mr Columbus sailed over the horizon and appeared to fall off the edge of the earth. That he returned requires the observer to re-evaluate his belief that the earth is flat, or else to dismiss what he saw with his own eyes. He need no alternative explanation to the shape of the earth however to conclude that his beliefs are at odds with his observations. Dr Lewis has boldly stated that the conclusions drawn by AGW proponents are at odds with scientific observation and method. His credentials as a scientist clearly make him a towering intellect, and his opinion that proper scientific method cannot be reconciled with the behaviour, evidence, or conclusions of AGW proponents stands as an idictment unto itself that requires no alternative theory to be advanced by him, or anyone else.
Robert E. Phelan;
I offer for your consideration the country boy IQ test:
There are five birds sitting on a branch. You shoot one bird. How many are left? The city-slicker boy says “That’s easy. Five birds less one is four.” The country boy says “huh, what makes you think birds are so dumb they’ll stick around after a gun-shot?”
Context is everything.>>
Yes it is. For starters, the city slicker is correct. There are four left. No where in your question was there a restriction in regard to where the birds were after the gun shot, so the answer is correct. If you provide precise boundary conditions such as “on the branch one millisecond later” the answer would still be four. If the boundary condition was “on the branch ten seconds later” then it is no longer a mathematical question, it is conjecture only. Math requires specific boundary conditions and results in the same answer regardless of language, culture or the use of roman instead of arabic numerals. Your example while mildly amusing, is not an example of math.
David, your math isn’t too good either. There are still 5 birds left, one of them dead but that wasn’t your boundary condition either.