Post Normal Ravetz Rumpus

“Now some people on this blog may believe that Connor is some paid hack or prostitute who is peddling alarmists’ lies”
What a truly despicable way to pretend that other people are saying what you, in fact, are thinking.

Dr. Ravetz, “clearly, there are those in the anti-AGW camp who think very ill of me.”
I must confess, I didn’t read you prior posting, as per my custom, I will skim/speed read a posting. I’ll read the start to attempt to get the gist of the post and then work my way back up to the start, and then back down if I deem is necessary. When I skimmed through, and I read your reference to Palin, I went to Curry’s and Goddard’s blogs.
I don’t think ill of you. I consider you a person who is attempting to explain and trying to understand at the same time. This is a good thing. But, you have to know the inflammatory nature of climate science discussion and political discussions, especially when Palin is mentioned. I guess what I’m saying is, if you play with fire you’re going to get burnt. You managed in one post to ignite the 2 of most volatile topics of conversation in the U.S. I’m surprised you didn’t write something about Obama’s Muslim heritage, that could have been a triflecta!
Finally, ” The Good, The True, The Just, The Holy and The Beautiful. These provide the moral compass for our behaviour. Now we know that these are goals and not states of being.” —————– One day, we’ll get there in the by and by.

Steve Conner came across as an obnoxious twit.
The disrespect he showed Freeman Dyson was stunning.

Dr. Ravetz,
“Now, if we say that science is mainly devoted to achieving the goal of truth …”
I’d say devoted not to “achieving” but rather to “pursuing” the truth, in fact, rather than “truth”, lets substitute “knowledge” or “understanding” or “insight”, it avoids the metaphysical baggage of truth.
The pursuit of knowledge is intellectual, it doesn’t require this kind of touchy feely stuff:
“A Sense of the Meeting is only achieved when those participating respect and care for one another. It requires a humble and loving spirit, imputing purity of motive to all participants and offering our highest selves in return. We seek to create a safe space for sharing.”
What it requires is intellectual honesty and the “space for sharing” does not have to be “safe”, lack of safety is just an emotional excuse for the climategate shenanigans. You don’t “share” in science, you expose your data and ideas to the critical light of day because what you really care about is getting the science right, and seeing it advanced further by yourself and others.
I would hope you’d be proud to be on the same side as Sarah Palin, she has the courage of her convictions and the willingness to stick to them despite popular opposition. After all, you are here where your ideas face some hostility, and perhaps take some pride in being willing to face the criticism and scrutiny. I embrace what Sarah Palin said, “Only dead fish go with the flow”. I think we get better science, when we don’t just go with the flow.

Jerome Ravetz: “And then (and here’s the kicker) it was realised that in extrapolating from the lab situation to the field situation, the method of extrapolation was more important in defining the dose-response relations in the field than was the lab data itself.”
That is the most telling sentence relative to post normal science in all you have written in these essays, Jerome. It provides a reference point, a benchmark, for consideration of the value and validity of PNS.

Dr. Ravetz writes: “The other path brings in broader considerations. Our inherited cultural teaching mentions a number of absolutes, including The Good, The True, The Just, The Holy and The Beautiful. These provide the moral compass for our behaviour. Now we know that these are goals and not states of being. Those who believe that they have achieved them are actually in a perilous state, for they are subject to delusion and hypocrisy.”
You nailed it Dr. Ravetz. This describes the majority of environmental activists I have gotten to know over the years.
Ironically (?) one of them once wrote that Sarah Palin is “pure evil.”

It’s really not that complicated.
The risk of adverse selection with respect to policy increases greatly in the presence of asymmetric information and moral hazard. This is the main problem with climate science today. In today’s complicated world, this matter comes up a lot in most of our dealings with people and institutions. Indeed, one could probably trace the first example of this to the Original Sin.
The continued obsification by many in the AGW community, scientific industry (academics and journals) and political interest groups have convinced me not to accept, prima facie, their main thesis. There is no point in entering into a debate when one party simply does not trust the other. This is not my problem to deal with. It is theirs if they want something from me.
To move forward is simple, just two ideas are required; transparency and good will.
Data must be freely shared and those with strong vested interests need to excuse themselves from the debate. If this isn’t possible then the proponents of the AGW theory bear the heavy burden of proof as they will also need to help others to prove their own case is wrong. If AGW is really that much of a concern then this is a sacrifice they should be willing to make for the sake of the planet.
Those not in the know need to be able to trust the scientific process. It’s incumbent on those who claim to be in the know (the scientists) to go out of their way to assure the rest of us due process has been followed in a free and transparent manner. It’s a basic point which has less to do with science and more to do with common sense.

Regarding what Roger Carr says (February 25, 2011 at 7:17 pm): In fact, all science is about method and procedure, not actual content at a given time. A theory that is the best attainable theory at time t may be disproved or superseded at time t+k, but both will be scientific theories if they were worked out by using scientific methods. Also, at a given time there might be two (or more) theories claiming to explain the same phenomena, and there may be impossible for the moment to tell which is best. That is the sorry situation in which imperfect humans are as regards the growth of scientific knowledge.
If everybody presents their scientific ideas in a calm and moderate voice, there might emerge a modicum of agreement on which they can report to politicians, possibly much less than politicians would wish. At that point politicians may make a proposal (which scientists would in turn evaluate, assessing pros and cons) and finally take action, with the risk of making an horrendous mistake albeit basing it on the best advice available.
For this to happen, scientific institutions such be functioning properly. There are many who have worked out proposals about such institutions of science, such as Merton and his CUDOS. It is unfortunate that such is not the setting on contemporary climate science. As in other inflammatory fields (stem cells, abortion, heritability of cognitive abilities, “race”, and more) the discussion is torn apart by partisanship and faith-based prejudice, and many go so far as to distort the scientific method and process (with indictments pointing at many, from Cyril Burt about heritable intelligence to our esteemed colleagues at CRU and UPenn about proxy reconstructions of past temperatures). At that point, rather than helping the politicians to attain better decisions, science (or what passes as science) is actually creating harmful noise. This is compounded, in the case of climate, by the call for the urgent allocation of enormous fiscal effort to policies derived from one of the partisan fields of scientific opinion, with huge economic consequences. Time to take pause, I would suggest.

Dr. Ravetz, it wasn’t the science that turned me around – at least at first.
What caused me to reject the CO2=Climate Catastrophe theory was the behavior of the TEAM.
Their behavior, toward Steve McIntyre in particular, but also toward others who disputed their work, in turn caused me to looked deeper into the science, which made me aware of just how poorly understood and uncertain the foundation of that theory is. It also showed just how far they had strayed from scientific principles in their activism.
Finally, with a better understanding of science behind AGW theory, I could no longer support the kind of policy actions that were being demanded on the basis of what I now know to be an extremely shaky foundation.

Re Freeman Dyson / Steve Connor letters; If you actually read the exchange you would have see a “journalist” try to create the answer at the start of the question.
Steve Connor is a pinhead. Right off “let us assume”, trying to box Dyson into a loosing argument. Dyson even gave him 2 out of 6. I would only give him 1. Conner should have asked questions and listened instead of expounding over and over the same lame positions. I would suggest Dr Ravetz go back and reread and evaluate the exchange. Dyson ended the exchange as it was a waste of his time. I concure pg

Dear Dr. Ravetz,
If your reference (to Quaker) was to my post, I was a obscure. Sorry. “Quaker background” was ambiguous in that it could be read both ways (member or influenced by). I hope my conclusion (that you use “non-violence” in a Quaker sense) is correct. The abusive word “Raqa” (~imbecile) in Mt 5:22 is an example of the violence that one should avoid in debate. Although I am not a Quaker, I think their understanding is worthy of respect, if not adoption.

I read that e-mail exchange between Connor and Dyson.I just thought Connor believes the message.The message that says we must do anything and everything to change the temperature.I didn’t see him as a prostitute.
The same as I don’t see Palin as a bible bashing hillbilly.
The one person who is corrupt is Al Gore.He doesn’t care what his hysteria brings,as long as it is money for him.Compare Al Gore’s mansions to Palin’s house.Right there you have the real value of the people you are placing your trust in.
I look and look for some concern,any concern for the women and children that have to live with the consequences of western governments deciding whether they get cheap food or access to basic stoves(they could only dream of a house with electricity).I see it nowhere in the writings on AGW by the people who believe.It is the sceptics that point out the misery being inflicted on people who had the bad luck to be born in a certain place.
Dyson made this point,Connor ignored it.
Al Gore does not care if Chinese children are dying in hovels racked by disease and pain,with no access to medical care,The only way they will get medical care is if the country keeps right on doing what they are doing.Took them a while to discover progress,and it will be a long time before children have access to basics,and in some areas they probably never will.You only have to read the news every day to know that the Chinese population’s lifestyle is improving every year.People like Hansen and Gore want to keep those children in hovels,so their grandchildren can be guaranteed safety.Selfish,selfish people.No time for them at all.
luckily the Chinese government doesn’t give a fig for AGW.They pay lip service,and keep right on developing.More power to them,I say.Go for it China and India,pollute as much as you like.One day you may reach western standards of living.Standards of living that was brought about by pollution.

vigilantfish says:
February 25, 2011 at 8:58 pm
Great post.

You can see hints in his comments, but elsewhere (? lost the link) Dyson observes that it would be many times quicker and cheaper to slightly/moderately modify siliviculture and agricultural practices if we really wanted to change the CO2 base level. He cites the diurnal and seasonal swings (many multiples of the base level changes discussed) as proof of the efficacy of the biosphere.

This has been educational. I did not know what “Post-Normal Science” was. I find Ravetz is an originator. Under “Criticisms” I find a Feynman reference to “Cargo Cult Science”
The term cargo cult science was first used by the physicist Richard Feynman …. in 1974, to negatively characterize research in the soft sciences … arguing that they have the semblance of being scientific, but are missing “a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty”.
Which brings us full circle to Climategate.
“Gimme that Old, Kind of Science,
Gimme that Old, Kind of Science,
It was good enough for Feynman,
And its good enough for me.”

Dr. Ravetz,
There are several things that you said that I dispute. Thr first being:
QUOTE
And of course this has been at the core of the Climategate dispute, arising out of the CRU emails, the question of the correctness of their results is tangled with the morality of their behaviour.
UNQUOTE
In fact, the two things stand or fall together.
Their own doubts about the robustness of their findings led them to a certain style of behaviour, whch some would say would not live up to best practice, as seen through the eyes of a member of the Quaker faith.
I trust that I make myself clear.

Dr Ravetz,
This portion of your interesting post tries to establish a dichotomy where there is none. I believe this error may be of central importance.
“On that there is the classic pronouncement by Galileo: ‘The conclusions of natural science are true and necessary, and the judgement of man has nothing to do with them.’ This is echoed in practice by generations of teachers, who present the facts dogmatically and discourage any questioning. I was one of those who reacted against that authoritarian style of scientific indoctrination.”
The following two statements are not mutually exclusive and, in fact, are both true:
A) The judgment of man has nothing to do with the conclusions of science.
B) Science can be taught non-dogmatically, with tremendous encouragement of endless questioning, in a non-authoritarian style.
One statement does not preclude the other. Perhaps this was your experience of science education (and you would have my sympathy) but it was certainly not my experience as a young scientist.
My science education was full of joy and discovery. It freed my mind from the chains of dogma and taught me how to pose insightful (and falsifiable) questions worth pursuing. There was only one absolute “dogma” and that was “There is an objective reality that exists independent of observers’ subjective perceptions of it.” Science is then defined as the continual process of pursuing increasingly more accurate understanding of that reality. We need to agree that there is an objective reality simply because if there isn’t then we each exist in a different reality and what is actually true in yours may be actually false in mine, making the whole endeavor of understanding reality rather pointless.
The fact that we humans seem to all have different internal perceptions of that objective reality is why we need such rigor in our scientific methods and precision in our communications. It is unlikely that we can ever attain an absolutely perfect and complete scientific understanding of any particular aspect of reality. However, we can pursue an understanding that is perfect enough and complete enough to be highly useful for a given purpose. Your toxicant scenario is an instructive example. I see nothing wrong with the principles of science in your scenario. The error was the choice of an inappropriate proxy. Testing rats for some weeks was not a suitable proxy for impact on humans over years (I’ll leave the obligatory joke about tree-ring proxies as an exercise for the reader).
Successfully solving the dire toxicant scenario does not require the invention of a new kind of science or changing the standards of our current science. We just need to be very clear about what degree of certainty is required for the science to be useful. Perhaps in this scenario children should have avoided exposure to any elevated level of the toxicant until a study was completed with a proxy more appropriate to the needs of the situation (perhaps a sufficiently longer trial with primates). If the cost of being wrong is high enough, further independent auditing, replication and verification may be warranted.
If obtaining an adequate level of confidence should happen to entail egregious hardships and astronomical costs (as all the best hypotheticals seem to) then science’s role is to accurately present the data that is currently known along with the associated confidence levels (especially lack thereof) and work diligently to ensure this data is clearly and fully presented including prominent focus on caveats, alternative viewpoints, conflicting data, possible weaknesses in methodology and, of course, the null hypothesis. The role of science is then concluded (at least until another question is asked). From that point difficult ethical, moral, economic or political decisions may need to be made based, in part, on the science. However, the scientific process itself should remain independent of these social issues because they involve subjective value judgments outside the domain of science.

“Dyson makes a very basic point, that the uncertainties are just too great for any firm policy decision to be made. Connor, by contrast, presents a number of scientific claims, all of which he believes to be solid and factual. Then the argument shifts to more general issues, and Dyson eventually pulls out.”
Dr. Ravetz – this is not an exchange of letters, or a jounalistic interview. It is a bulldozer (the journalist) attempting to run over a man of reason (and failing).
“Now some people on this blog may believe that Connor is some paid hack or prostitute who is peddling alarmists’ lies; but it is also possible that he really believes what he is saying.”
Dr. Ravetz – nobody cares whether Connor is a “prostitute” or as Lenin might say a “useful idiot”. The outward behaviour, constant changing of subject, and obstinate refusal to engage in debate or discussion are the same in both cases.
All the best.

Pooh, Dixie says:
February 25, 2011 at 9:34 pm
…
The high stakes of catastrophic anthropogenic global warming occur only if the models and feedback are correct. If they are not, then the issue is not urgent. Warming of 1.2oC is well within adaptions used today. Catastrophic policy measures would not be required.
Indeed. It always seems to circle back to a demand to accept the presumption before beginning discussion. And rage when that wee concession is refused.

I don’t follow O’Connor, but from your description, sounds like many who are blessed with the ability to regurgitate points (of whatever value) in the hope that it makes them seem smarter than they really are. While I appreciate links for the purpose of learning, I often see the denizens of RC come out with Blitzkrieg reams of their overwhelming “proof” which means nothing, sadly till time is taken (or wasted) to wade through their crud. That some have the patience and time to do this is amazing and I, personally am very thankful. Joe public though can be fooled (well at least once!!).
That leads me to PNS which could be described in its worst form as “jumping to conclusions” with the attendant and strident calls to act immediately, there is no time, your children’s children will hate you for delaying action. I say, that the minute the two are put together, the “precautionary principle” must be invoked to give that set of godlike conclusions a more rigorous going over IMHO!.
Is the “science” word in PNS just added to give the researchers conclusion more credibility to their sense of urgency and thus ignore or avoid more rigorous scientific validation and testing, i.e. just another appeal to authority?
Unfortunately the peer review system that should have given us “some” confidence, that the work and conclusions were valid, didn’t do this, due to being less rigorous than touted, and even worse prostituted/corrupted by some.
IF PNS is to be accepted as better than just jumping to convenient conclusions, it needs a more formal and rigorous examination before using in any policy decision making. A good precautionary principle to be applied for starters!

Dr. Ravetz. We agree, you and I, on may points; we differ on some, perhaps the differences are more definitional then anything else. Mostly we differ in our view of what science is all about. We scientists may think and wish and perhaps strive for the truth. However, in science we do not achieve truth and we do not even seek it. We seek and strive for falsification of our ideas. That is the best we can do. On my blog I have over 100 short essays, that address many of these points from that specific scientific view. Just hit my name and the link will be established.
It is most critical that we understand as scientists, that following the scientific method and philosophy, our efforts are amoral. What we do with or how we interpert those amoral findings is governed by our ethical and moral beliefs. This is where the process of science leads us or is supposed to lead us. I, like you, have chosen to focus on that process rather then overly concern myself with the intimate and often mathematical details. It is the philosophy of science, the process, that is most critical.
As your moral musings points out, the best we can do is search for that middle ground between the extremes, knowing, mostly by observation, the extremes are almost always in greatest error.

How about some Quiz Time?
Quiz Subject Concepts => CAGW Pre-cautionary Principle Concept vs. Soviet Era Pre-emptive Nuclear Strike Concept vs. Original Sin Concept Man by the Ideological Environmentalists
Question – Which of the 3 subject concepts has any basis scientific; especially any validation by observations of nature?
Answer – None. Hey, thought I would throw the Soviet Era Military Strategy Craziness in the just for entertainment value. : )
So, Mr Jerome Ravetz, please do not mislead us by often implying a relationship between the term ‘pre-cautionary principle’ and terms involving ‘science’ in the same paragraph or sentence or post. Science, per se, as a conceived in the tradition of Western Civilization does not do pre-cautionary principles. If pre-cautionary principles are used, it is by something else, not science.
But I think it may be possible to relate the terms ‘PNS’ and ‘pre-cautionary principle’ since neither has to do with the science of the Western Civilization; but it is also possible that PNS and pre-cautionary principles are unrelated.
Good luck with reviving PNS since it was never alive. Not alive in this 21st century and wasn’t alive in the 18th or 19th or 20th centuries either.
Jerome Ravetz, what has changed that makes you think it (PNS) can now have life? Is it because CAGW has reduced the stature in our society of the concept of science to such a low point that Western Civilization will grasp at any non-scientific alternative?
John

Nicely said Willis!
Brings one of my favorite aphorisms to mind:
Reality is the stuff that’s still there even when you stop believing in it.

The Independent, like the Guardian, carries a brightly flaming torch for climate alarmism. I have yet to see a balanced argument on AGW come from either rag. Anyone who views Connor’s post normal BS as a triumph for science and truth is deluding themselves.

The issue remains: what is so different about climate science? It was a start to see that the argument is similar for a public health issue.
Now take the question of saturated fat, cholesterol, heart disease and statins. You will find that all the same issues arise. It is hard to connect saturated fat consumption to cholesterol, its also problematic to connect that to heart disease, and then we find that statins have their own risks, and that when we add cholesterol lowering properties to them, the death rate rises. So do we, or do we not, have a case for abandonning our recommendations on lowering saturated fat consumption? Do we or do we not have a case for mass dosage of the middle aged with statins?
You will find the same issues of uncertainty, of interest groups (drug suppliers, dairy producers, the corn and soy lobby). There is the same issue of decision under uncertainty when the scientific data is only part of the issue, because there are other public health issues involved like cancer rates and obesity. Something similar happened with MMR vaccine.
In short, the situation in terms of climate is unusual for science because it is a relatively small number of scientific hypotheses that get involved at the center of public policy debate. But it is absolutely standard for public policy debate involving scientific or other issues where the facts are arguable and uncertain.
Prof Ravetz is missing the point because he thinks the issue is about science, he then takes one particular situation, the public policy one, and then invents this nonsensical post normal science concept. In fact, what he needs to focus on is the absolutely standard situation of public policy decisions under scientific or other uncertainty.
The issue is not about science, or climate science. Its about public policy. The sooner we realise that and stop looking for something different in modern science, the better. We just need to think hard about how to make public policy decisions where the facts and outcomes of choices are uncertain and the costs either way very high.
There is however nothing post normal about this. Imagine the shift to the Dreadnought, or to oil fired battleships, or the decisions on developing the atom bomb. The situation is entirely normal. The question is only how to handle it better.

I think this post by Dr. Ravetz is significant for two reasons.
The ‘communications department’ of PNS undoubtedly assumed that they could manufacture the political consent to support whatever they desired with a combination of a ‘consensus’ peer review and publishing process and controlled media campaigns. As in the AGW project. But the new world of peer review and publishing on the uncontrollable blogosphere, as on this site, threw a monkey wrench into that plan. Back when “the science was settled” the AGW team was in a state of aggressive denial about that. Then they reacted with more hostility and attempted dismissals as irrelevant, incredible, Big Oil, and all that – a place where only “deniers” lurked. That didn’t work. Now we have Dr. Ravetz arguing his case here. Sort of like Caesar crossing the Rubicon in reverse. The world is turning. Looks like the blogosphere could be relevant after all.
Second, Dr. Ravetz’s posts here are bound to be part of some future historical analysis of PNS and the AGW project.
So congratulations to Dr. Ravetz for making what I hope is a little history and to Anthony for being the ‘chosen’ blog.

If Dr Ravetz didn’t mean to imply that he is (was) a Quaker, why on earth did he mention attending a Quaker school? This is an example of his prose, which is so convolute that my eyes tend to glaze over at about the mid point, but in the interests of fairness, I forced myself to read the entire epistle. When he admits ‘mind reading’ again, as in his having to deal with comments he ‘remembered’ Willis uttering, I gave up my attempt to make sense of his article. He reminds me of a former NZ Prime Minister who was famous for incredibly long and complex replies to simple questions, summed up by a wit of the day who said
“By the time he has made a reply, I have forgotten what my question was!”

Dyson was wrong to cut and run when the questions became too difficult. Remember the derision that was heaped on James Cameron when he pulled out of that debate with Marc Marano? Well, now Dyson has done the same – but not a word of criticism on these pages. Instead Steve Connor is called a ‘hack’ for asking difficult questions.
The question Dyson baulked at was this –
“The mainstream estimate suggests that doubling CO2 from pre-industrial levels would increase global average temperatures by about 3C. If you accept that CO2 levels have never been higher, but not that global average temperatures have increased, where has the extra trapped heat gone to? Can we deal with this before we go on? ”
To which Dyson refuses to answer, saying that he would prefer to talk about something else. He then changes the subject and talks about Wegener’s theory of drifting continents. What has that to do with price of eggs?
Dyson then says that he doesn’t believe there is any ‘trapped’ heat because he doesn’t like computer models. But he has already conceded that CO2 is a greenhouse gas that warms the planet and that there is more CO2 in the atmosphere than there was before. To declare at this stage that there is no trapped heat is thus a non sequitur.
So, the question remains on the table. It requires an answer. None of the commentators so far have ventured to answer it.
Has any sceptic got an answer? Or would you prefer to talk about drifting continents?

Forgive the longest post I have done, but please read if you ever found anything I had to say of value. The entire issue of PNS and CAGW is rooted in these conditions. ‘facts uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and decisions urgent’ and the PNS theory from there moves to how to create policy in such a situation. An example. Some volcanoes in Iceland erupt and send ashes into the flight pattern of air traffic. It may be ok to fly, it may not be. The reward risk to the airlines is plain. Suffer the inconvenience of postponing flights and losing a modest amount of business, or risk the death of hundreds or thousands of passengers and millions in lawsuits and financial ruin. Easy decision correct?
Let us hypothetically make it more complicated. Let us suppose that if we do not fly there is a fair chance that hundreds will still die, and we could still suffer millions in lawsuits and face financial ruin. So a simple fact becomes clear. The greater the risk of the prescribed policy, the greater the need for certainty in our decision.
Every decisions we make in life as individuals and societies is based on such discrimination of weighing the cost benefit of our actions, so in reality there is nothing post normal about it, and the term PNS is of necessity vague, as at what point such a circumstance is reached, “‘facts uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and decisions urgent,” is going to be different for different people.
In the case of CAGW the policy prescribed, in and of itself, places values in dispute and has high stakes with very uncertain results.
I maintain that the answer to such a situation lies in protecting the science as it is classically defined, as the better the science is done, the more capable we are to determine how objectively urgent the actions or policy is. Take another hypothetical, that of a 1 kilometer wide meteorite headed towards the earth at 60,000 miles per hour. Only good science and mathematics can tell us if it is a real threat and if we can do anything about it. The bigger the meteorite, the greater the need for accurate science to both determine the threat level, and our ability to respond. The decision of what to do becomes more difficult if we perceive that the meteorite has a 50% chance of missing us, and our attempt to move it through atomic bombs has an equally large chance of causing some large pieces to hit us, when if left alone it may miss us entirely. What if one country wants to nuke, and another says no way, we will attack you if you try, we think your accuracy with the nuke could just as easily hit the wrong side of the meteorite and kill millions.
The above situation is admittedly very difficult, yet still, the better the science, the better the chances are of making the right decision. Now to move from the general to the particular. Fortunately we are not faced with the meteorite decision in the case of CAGW, although a relatively small group of scientist decided we were, (see the Wegman report) , They quickly gained the support of a large group of people, (centrist politicians) who found the actions they recommended to be harmonious with their view of how societies should operate. One of these scientist, James Hansen, talked extensively about the need for action and indicated that within a couple of decades New York would be underwater. One politician who liked the idea of central power, Al Gore, supported policy which would give central government on a national and international level, and made a movie about the issue of CAGW and talked of sea levels rising twenty feet. The example of these two men, one a scientist, one a centrist politician, became a microcosmic example for the summary writers that formed the IPCC, demanding action now. In unison they presented to the world a hockey stick shaped graphic that proved how mankind’s actions had created unprecedented changes in climate.
Here we are decades later, and the failed predictions of disaster are becoming more apparent every day. The hockey stick is discredited to all but a few. Yet the proponents of CAGW only dance faster. The pace of warming stops for a decade, and the term “global warming” is out, climate change is in. The predicted disasters fail to manifest, and so now, failing to get warming and failing to get accelerated mega disasters, common extreme weather events are being touted as proof of CAGW. Unusual snow for one or two years is now proof of global warming. All of this with no evidence of an acceleration of such events anomalous from many other periods of extreme weather, or indeed, any proof of an acceleration of extreme weather in general. Events we have always had, become proof of CAGW, an utterly and completely unscientific proposition. Many of the proponents of CAGW, who hate capitalism and America, go to the poor in third world situations of natural disaster, and taking advantage of their tragedy tell them that the evil industrial people like Americans caused their hurricane or drought, and they should be compensated.
And rational people understandably say as did Willis, “I say that if there are PNS situations, we need to recognize the dangers, double down on the science, and not substitute “quality” and excessive caution for science” and another poster states, “But I am convinced that the best way forward is to show that urgent decisions are not required and that allows us all to go back to normal science.” and myself, quoting Revetz; “When facts are uncertain, when values are in conflict, when stakes are high, when decisions seem urgent, the FIRST casualty is “normal” science. “ say the first obligation of policy makers, those with integrity to truth, should be to PROTECT and defend “NORMAL” science, and not let it be a casualty” Many others state this as well.
The response to this from a luke-warmist who I admire is shocking. Steve Mosher states “how exactly do you propose to show that? By forcing them to do the science you want? your way? That sounds like bending the science to your political will…”
Steve this is easy, you expose the bad science, you show that sea level rise is not accelerating, you show that warming is slowing or even stopped from it peak 13 years ago, quite simply, you use good science (Lindzen, Spencer, Idso and thirty thousand other scientist) and real world observations to show that action is not urgent and CO2 is beneficial. You do not force them to do science “your way, you do FORCE them to do science according to the “scientific method” with complete openness of methods, data and metadata. This is not bending them to an individuals way, this is bending them to the scientific method which they abandoned.
Steve Mosher goes on, “ Here’s the problem. Once science has been politicized you cannot “simply” return to normal science. It takes the use of power to do that. Are you going to force Hansen to think differently? defund him? defund all the scientists who believe action is required? Stop all science ( thats way abnormal). Sorry, the return to normal science is not a simple re virgination process. Its inherently political. post normal.”
Mr Mosher, you have presented here an irrational straw man in somehow claiming that a call to return to normal science to better determine if actions are urgent, is somehow a call to “stop all science”. It is very obviously not. And yes, you do investigate these scientist through the political process, and not with a white wash, and you do demand openness and a return to the scientific method. Scientist and the public who do not agree with Hansen’s choices of policies, which mimic the actions of a totalitarian regime, the “Peoples Republic of China” whom Hansen holds as an example to emulate, will be resisted. Do you think only those who are proactive CAGW supporters have the right to policy “power’ and “force”? Are those who say that they do not think action is urgent, powerless? And hell yes, you do attempt to defund many “what if” studies, so more research can go into what the real climate sensitivity to increased CO2. Does only the people that predict disaster have the right to form policy? Damm it Steve, this is as old as civilization; “When first the tyrant appears, he is a protector” Plato.

It is perhaps indicative of the fuzzy netherworld that Dr Ravetz’ arguments inhabit that he should even mention the Connor/Dyson exchange. But, like his perverse Sarah Palin reference, and his unsubstantiated (by his own admission) attack on Willis, there seems to be one in every statement – an off the wall comment based in personalia which is irrelevant to the issue under discussion.
The Connor/Dyson exchange was a grotesque exercise whereby a journalist who is not fit to tie the bootlaces of the interviewee launches a series of harangues – pre-scripted by others as he is not a scientist – which make no attempt to engage with what the interviewee is actually saying.
Connor’s technique is familiar – on Dr Judith Curry’s recent descent into the maelstrom of believers (see her blog), she was bombarded with – but have you read this, this and this, and if not, how can you comment? – none of which had anything to do with the point she was making.
Connor is a lousy journalist, as well as an arrogant jerk. He had the opportunity to engage in discussion with one of the most powerful and interesting minds in science, whatever Dyson’s views on this or that issue might be. He blew it in favour of bombarding Dyson with propaganda and demanding responses to each point that someone else had written for him. I think that Dyson was remarkably polite and tolerant, and also has been around the block enough times to recognise a tyre kicking time waster when he meets one.
As PPs have said, the sincerity of an individual’s belief in no way correlates to the accuracy of that belief.
None of this has anything to do with proper discussion of ‘post-normal science’ (an oxymoron, IMHO). But perhaps it is an indicator of the mindset of at least one of its proponents.

The problem with the AGW crowd is that they seem to think we don’t care about the planet which is completely wrong.
Fossil fuels may well increase CO2 and cause issues…or not depending on your views, however I think we would all agree that there are real poisons and nasties emitted from vehicles and factories that we could all do without.
We are suffering from so many allergies it is obvious that there should be alarm bells ringing with regard to fossil fuels.
But what is our response?…don’t do this…don’t do that…. and only the rich who can afford to pay carbon offsets can travel etc etc.
Aside from human health and the state of the planet we have the not inconsiderable problem of perpetual war for oil.
It simply is not good enough,
When asked about the AGW issue a former UK politician Michale Portillo said “if the technology that mankind is using is causing a problem then change the technolgy”.
It’s a simple enough message.
Three years ago BBC;s Top Gear featured the Honda Clarity a hydrogen powered car and it got the thumbs up for all concerned. S

Bomber_the_Cat says:
February 26, 2011 at 2:49 am
Dyson was wrong to cut and run when the questions became too difficult. ..
The question Dyson baulked at was this –
“The mainstream estimate suggests that doubling CO2 from pre-industrial levels would increase global average temperatures by about 3C. If you accept that CO2 levels have never been higher, but not that global average temperatures have increased, where has the extra trapped heat gone to? Can we deal with this before we go on? ”
So, the question remains on the table. It requires an answer. None of the commentators so far have ventured to answer it.
Has any sceptic got an answer? Or would you prefer to talk about drifting continents?”
Bomber it is a Childs question, and a quite insulting simplistic and false statement, the very words of which are not an attempt at dialogue. ““The mainstream estimate suggests that doubling CO2 from pre-industrial levels would increase global average temperatures by about 3C.” This is completely false. The premise is wrong and Connor knows it. The doubling LWIR radiant effect from doubled CO2 is not 3 C, it is about 1C and all moderately informed know this, including Connor. (Apparently you are not even moderately informed) This garbage premise shows complete lack of sincerity in dialogue. Any one with minor knowledge knows the issue is feedbacks and other aspects of physics besides straight radiation, like cloud formation, location, and convection, and their affects on SWR and heat loss, evaporation and hydrologic system latent energy transport effects, etc, which can easily overwhelm the straight radiant CO2 effects.

Science is about objective reasoning. In the affairs of human beings there are huge areas where we use subjective reasoning, often driven by emotion and belief. Our brains evolved to do subjective reasoning with objective reasoning, seemingly, a recent adaptation.
Practicing science is hard for us, it relies on our limited ability to reason objectively and put aside our subjective prejudices.
Mixing subjective and objective reasoning as Post-Normal ‘Science’ and pretending it is a valid way of doing Science only serves to obfuscate and confuse our understanding of nature.
If subjective activities (e.g. policy making) are to benefit from objective assessments of nature (Science) we need to maintain a clear distinction in our definitions, practices and naming of these distinct areas of human endeavour. PNS is a retrograde step.

Our inherited cultural teaching mentions a number of absolutes, including The Good, The True, The Just, The Holy and The Beautiful. These provide the moral compass for our behaviour. Now we know that these are goals and not states of being.

Please speak for yourself, you cannot speak for me. I personally know goodness, truth and beauty as both goal and state of being, and perception of qualities, say in Willis’ posts. Note I use the natural form of these words, not the artificial philosopher’s form. I experience them at work better like this, but also only when applied to my efforts to do what really needs to be done, if necessary getting my hands dirty. In this case, this means IMHO starting to get a handle on the science. So that your essay and moral comments in it can be filled with examples that are taken out of the story of Climate Science, not superfluities from other areas of life.
Peter Taylor is right IMO, our abdication of scientific understanding and allowing petty usurpers to rule, has to do with the neglect of apprehending, with care, sensitivity, and the tools of Science, the inner realms of Reality.
Once again, please let me recomment my Primer. Click my name. I wrote it to re-empower people of reasonable intelligence, whether or not they have any prior professional understanding of Science. I wrote it as “my story” to make it accessible even though it is not perfect.

Dyson:

I am saying that all predictions concerning climate are highly uncertain.

Connor:

It seems to me that although there are still many uncertainties, much of the science of climate change is pretty settled, more so than you will admit to. To continue to report on “both sides” as you suggest is rather like ringing up the Flat Earth Society and asking them to comment on new discoveries in plate tectonics.

Dyson:

Your last message just repeats the same old party line that we have many good reasons to distrust.

Well Jerry, there we have the essence of the conversation. Some two-bit eco-journalist Emails a world renowned physicist requesting his insight then proceeds to question the guy’s integrity, states he’s not interested in listening anyway and becomes insulting.
Next, you turn up here with your pseudo-philosophical mumbo jumbo and attempt to throw fuel on the fire.

Now some people on this blog may believe that Connor is some paid hack or prostitute who is peddling alarmists’ lies; but it is also possible that he really believes what he is saying.

Who gives a damn what Connor believes? He’s not “the expert”. Does it not occur to you that Dyson has probably encountered many such hack traps before? If you’re really interested in reconciliation and so forth perhaps you ought to be having words with Connor.
But instead you come here, set up a straw man argument based on reading Freeman Dyson’s mind and attempt to use that to further your PNS nonsense (while subliminally reinforcing the arrogant purpose common to too many of the Oxbridge clique). Who exactly do you think you’re fooling with your naive interloper propaganda act, its classic submissive goading and rambling reinforcement? It’s becoming pitifully tedious.
Look, there’s no get out of jail free card even for utopian collectives. You’re a part of evolution too. History has chewed up and spat out superficially benign tyrannical belief systems like yours many times before. Where they’ve been allowed to fester and run amok, it always takes atrocity and immense suffering to finally bring that about. Which is as it should be; nature thrives on competition and will not tolerate the abhorrence of socialism beyond expediency for very long, however you dress it up.

David,
Describing a question as a “Child’s question” (4.14AM) and then failing to answer it does not does not really constitute a sound scientific argument. If the question is easy (which it isn’t) then answer it.
You see, the proponents of global warming will pose questions such as this. If you are unable to answer or have a tantrum, then they win their case by default.
“The mainstream estimate suggests that doubling CO2 from pre-industrial levels would increase global average temperatures by about 3C” is not false. This is what the IPCC claim. Now, they may be wrong – but it is not false to say that they claim that. You see the difference? So, Steve Connor is quite right to say that.
You got off to a good start in answering though, because the 3 Deg.C figure is the first thing to challenge. It assumes a feedback effect which has never been observed in this world throughout geological time. But Dyson didn’t do this. he ran for cover.
As for your figure of 1 deg.C, this is the no-feedback calculation. I tend to favour this too, but this is NOT what most so-called climate scientists would agree with. So the assertion that all moderately informed people know this is, I think, incorrect.
I notice that you didn’t try to answer the rest of the question, so it remains on the table. Notice that no other experts on this site wish to chance their arm at it.
I realise from succeeding comments that you are ‘tired’, so I will forgive your childish assumptions of what my position really is. But I think the scientific case must be MADE and questions like this have to be dealt with properly – not avoided!
I have just posted on another article here a link to Ross McKitrick’s
Questions for a Journalist
I recommend it. In fact, if Freedman Dyson had read these questions, maybe he could have held his own with Steve Connor.

vigilantfish —
Thanks for the excellent post. As one who *was* raised as a Quaker, and an environmentalist, and in the 1970’s even a follower of the Club of Rome, I appreciate your acute analysis of the historical and social context in which the latter two movements arose. It is a new day and I try to notice what the evidence suggests to be true, rather than remain mired in an honorable but mistaken past.
A number of friends and associates who are still drinking the kool-aid are disappointed that life is about learning new things as you go; when the signs of planetary cooling first became quite apparent several years ago I started to pay attention to what the environment was actually *doing* and moved on from there to notice the utterly indefensible methods of the AGW crowd, starting with Mr. Gore’s astounding inability to read cause and effect in his 200 foot long graphs correlating global C02 and temperature.
Sadly, many students slept through the preliminary lectures on cause and effect, cyclical patterns in nature, and theory of feedbacks (hint: they also didn’t do the assigned readings from Gregory Bateson). Consequently they still think Gore is credible because his graph was so big and it showed an obvious correlation.
Dr. Ravetz —
My field of expertise is literary studies (I read here to broaden my horizons and study the dynamics of debate and science in public discourse at a level just enough above my comprehension to be educational without being incomprehensible).
The term “post-normal science” sounds too much like “post-modernism” to me to attract my sympathetic ear. I’ve seen what that particular doctrine has done to literary studies, and while some practitioners have produced some intriguing new perspectives operating within the paradigm (I always like to keep the baby even when the bathwater is rancid), the reigning ideology behind it is a train wreck.
It started, interestingly enough, on the barricades of Paris in 1968.
Roland Barthes, then a young student, proclaimed that the author had to be sacrificed, along with God and the State, in order to liberate the reader. An understandable hyperbole for a passionate young man in tumultuous times — yet Barthes has lived quietly in the French state and made his peace (apparently) with God for another 50+ years without recognizing how foolish such a proclamation looks in the 21st century.
One suspects the anti-author ideology endures because, in the absence of a common text serving not only as shared experience but also as *evidence* it concentrates all the authority of a classroom in the hands of a tyrannical professor. The author is dead — therefore the text means what the *professor* says it does. That Prof *was* an anti-authoritarian (it was popular to be so) in Grad school, but now he tolerates nothing that could undermine his authority — since, after all, order depends on authority, and he likes his pension plan.
Replace the word “author” with “fundamental physics and logic” and I think this parable identifies the historical origins of “The Team.” “Hiding the decline” is now more important than returning to first principles to discover the source of error. Is that what you mean by “post-normal?”
I sure hope not. If “post-normal” science can’t *recognize and name* the flaws in AGW “thinking” and the manner in which simple questions like cause and effect have been turned on their heads in the service of ideology, then it is, as some other respondents have noted, rooted in a past that no longer exists.
I’m a graying teacher myself, and the first rule of good teaching is: listen to your students. And in this case that means the ones talking back in the comments section. I believe you’re sincerely attempting to do that and I salute you for it. But honestly, Freeman Dyson needs a physics lesson from a bullying reporter?
-psi

Steve Mosher goes on, “ Here’s the problem. Once science has been politicized you cannot “simply” return to normal science. It takes the use of power to do that. Are you going to force Hansen to think differently? defund him? defund all the scientists who believe action is required? Stop all science ( thats way abnormal). Sorry, the return to normal science is not a simple re virgination process. Its inherently political. post normal.”
———————————————–
David, thanks for reposting this comment of Steve Mosher’s, which deserves further attention (and your comments were spot on).
Just to establish my credentials as a grumpy feminist, could I say that ‘de-virginising’ is a ludicrous concept to apply to science. If Steve Mosher could explain what that means, he will be charting new horizons in the philosophy of science, not to mention anatomy. But, if he is saying that science is ‘ruined’, because she has had sex with a man, he is in deeper water still.
Secondly, it is flying in the face of history to say that panics allegedly supported by science cannot be reversed. DDT is now being used (tentatively) to combat malarial mosquitoes in Africa. The MMR/autism scare, which affected immunisation rates, has been debunked. Nobody now believes, as we were told in the early days of television, that you have to be a certain distance away from the screen, with a particular kind of lighting, to avoid permanent damage to eyesight.
What is instructive about the examples mentioned above is that they were all carried on a wave of public sentiment. They pandered to the fears and prejudices of the day.
To suggest that scientists should just ‘go along to get along’, cloaking it under the name of PNS or anything else, is disgraceful. And, suggesting that because science and public policy have become mixed, science’s virginity has been irretrievably broken, misrepresents both science and virginity.

Jerome, You are a wonderful propagandist. Not just any ordinary propagandist but a wonderful one. You are right up there with Tokyo Rose. Let’s check out one of you complete thoughts, a whole paragraph, as follows:
“One way out of that problem is to believe that scientific truth is indeed absolute. On that there is the classic pronouncement by Galileo: “The conclusions of natural science are true and necessary, and the judgement of man has nothing to do with them.” This is echoed in practice by generations of teachers, who present the facts dogmatically and discourage any questioning. I was one of those who reacted against that authoritarian style of scientific indoctrination. Now, if one is doing routine puzzle-solving research, the issue of truth is not too pressing; one can know that somehow, somewhere, one’s results will be superceded in one way or another; but that’s all over the horizon. But in cases of urgent policy-related research like the toxicant example I mentioned above, to believe that one’s anecdotes or one’s lab-rats give the truth about the danger of the toxicant, is mistaken and inappropriate. For when such conflicting results are negotiated, what comes into play is their quality.”
Your reference is to Galileo is roughly equivalent to “There is a painting of Galileo wearing a t-shirt with the logo ‘Pope IS Truth’.” Sorry, but it was laundry day and the t-shirt was a gift. Galileo struggled, literally, against authoritarians, created the scientific method, applied it brilliantly, and explained it to the world. That one creation just might be the greatest gift of Western Civilization to humanity. As Galileo explained, scientific method is the creation of hypotheses which explain and predict observable phenomena. Notice that the purpose of scientific method is to keep the scientist focused on the phenomena, on the world, not on fantasies.
Scientific Method continues to rule real science. The people at CERN, real scientists all, have spent a gazillion dollars because they predicted the existence of phenomena whose discovery would permit them to make some genuine choices among conflicting physical theories. See, prediction and explanation of phenomena in the world still rules. They did not build the CERN project for the purpose of sitting around some table and discussing rules of civility. Among climate scientists, at least pro-AGW climate scientists, there is not one who is focused on observable phenomena and, in general, the world. In fact, “hide the decline” proves beyond a reasonable doubt that they are committed to preventing a focus on observable phenomena. When forty years of data that you collected conflict with your theory, heck, just erase the data. That is climate science and that is what you are defending. You are defending the most flagrant abuse of evidence and of empiricism in the history of science. Please focus and address the real questions.
If all climate scientists would simply agree that the thing to do now is to convene focused conferences, with full participation by sceptics, whose purpose it is to create a new measurement regime for climate science then everybody would jump on board. Bygones would be bygones. But the pro-AGW folks will never do that because then they could not control the data.

“That is not a simple hypothesis to be decided by an experimental test.”
I can’t help thinking this is were you’re going wrong. Down the line the correct experiments will be performed to give us the level of certainty we require it’s just difficult to see when that will happen. There are at least in some areas the tools in place that are designed to give us the data we require.
I’m a little confused about your LD50 example. Nobody rejects this method. In fact the people ‘defending’ the toxicant don’t reject it as a sourse of truth, they are simply arguing special mitigating circumstances in this particular instance. When they go to a restaurant following the inquiry I’m sure they still assume (demand) that everything going into their mouth is at an appropriate level below it’s LD50. The general truth of the LD50 test as a measure of toxicants still stands in the minds of everybody involved in the case.
The only example I know of somebody bypassing the LD50 altogether is John Selwyn Gummer who at the height of the BSE scare choose to feed hamburgers to his daughter. I don’t think this alternative is going to catch on though.

Here are some queries for “common ground” I have for the CAGW faithful in the same vein as Conner had for Dyson (agree or disagree):
1) the earth is billions of years of old and during most of the past 500 million when life radiated from the oceans to the land the earth had no ice caps
2) for the past 3 million years the earth has been in an ice age
3) for the past 15,000 years ice age glaciers have been in retreat in what’s called an interglacial period which is a slight temporary warming in the midst of an ice age
4) the average length of the more recent interglacial periods is 15,000 years while the average length of the recent glacial periods is 100,000 years
5) in all the earth’s history there has never been a “runaway greenhouse”
6) during much of the past 500 million years atmospheric CO2 levels were anywhere from 2x to 10x what they are today
7) CO2 level and global temperature at this moment are quite low compared to most of the past 500 million years
8) plant growth ceases when atmospheric CO2 drops below 150ppm and increases up to as much as 2000ppm
9) plants requires less water per unit of growth as CO2 level increases
10) the periods of great biological fecundity in the past 500 million years happened when the earth was much warmer with much more atmospheric CO2 than today
11) the earth has experienced a small number of ice ages prior to the present ice age and some of those persisted for tens of millions of years
12) there is not enough economically recoverable fossil fuel to increase atmospheric CO2 to anywhere near the concentration during the warmest greenest episodes in the earth’s history
All of the above are as reliably true as can be according to the indisputable testimony of the geologic column.
Therefore, IF atmospheric CO2 is rising due to anthropogenic burning of fossil fuels and IF that amount of CO2 can cause a measurable amount of warming THEN burning of fossil fuels is a great boon for life on this planet as it will
1) help to delay the end of the Holocene interglacial and perhaps even end the 3 million years of ice age
2) extend growing seasons in high northern and southern latitudes
3) increase productivity of the primary producers in the food chain to the benefit of everything alive farther up the food chain
4) decrease the amount of fresh water that terrestrial plants require per unit of growth
So what I’m faced with is a decision between accepting what appears to be a bogus hypothesis about runaway warming due to anthropogenic CO2. Never before in the earth’s history when most of the time CO2 levels were vastly higher has there been a runaway greenhouse. To promote this as a credible hypothesis especially when the earth is in a 3 million year-old ice age during an interglacial period which is statistically overdue to end is contrary to all evidence we have of the earth’s history. If anything we should be TRYING to boost atmospheric CO2 for the benefit of the biosphere. On the flip side there is what appears to be a contingent of lunatics who want to hobble the economic growth of the world spreading misery and death to billions in the name of reducing atmospheric CO2 which just about everyone agrees can be practically accomplished to any degree which would make any significant difference in global temperature.
So I’m asked to back throwing money at a “problem” that is actually a blessing. The only “settled science” in all this as far as I’m concerned is the risk/reward equation. Trying to marginally curb anthropogenic CO2 production is just about all risk and just about no reward. Continuing on the present path appears to be just about all reward and just about no risk.
The only valid reason I can see for limiting fossil fuel consumption is conservation. I believe there is a limited amount of economically recoverable fossil fuel and at the current pace of consumption and growth in consumption it’s going to get nothing more than more expensive going forward. Less expensive means of supplying energy is always a good thing as it directly translates into higher living standards for everyone. Less expensive and renewable is even better. However, developing a less expensive alternative to fossil fuels won’t be accomplished by hobbling the extant economy. R&D is expensive and if supplying the needs of billions of people takes a larger bite out of global productivity there will be less to spend on developing a cheap renewable source of energy. In other words you DO NOT kill the goose that lays the golden eggs until you have secured another goose to replace it. Doing otherwise is insane.

R2 says:
February 26, 2011 at 4:03 am
“It’s ironic that those subjects that follow the scientific method rarely have ‘science’ in their name (physics, chemistry etc)…
… and those that tack ‘science’ onto their name rarely follow the scientific method!”
It is called “Cargo Cult” Religion.

I think the most important contribution of Dr. Ravetz concerns the use of rhetoric. Scientists on all sides of the climate debate use non-scientific terms to score points. As an example, above someone described Steve Connor as a “pinhead.” Dr. Curry recently posted on her blog, linked on WUWT, that members of the AGW “team” were “dishonest.” Famously, “team” members refer to AGW “skeptics” as “deniers” or “denialists.” None of these are scientific terms, but emotionally-charged, value-laden labels. Thus when Curry labels Schmidt “dishonest,” this enables Schmidt to puff up his righteous indignation and defend himself from an attack upon his character, rather than defend his scientific reasoning. It’s perhaps not emotionally satisfying, but I think the non-scientific community will be better served by those scientists who stick with arguing about facts and avoid resorting to emotionally-charged character evaluations of their opponents. I’m aware that this is very difficult, both because all humans are subject to emotional responses, and because even the determination of what constitutes a “fact” is under dispute.

Dr Ravetz,
I followed the many well written criticisms of your article in the previous thread, the responses in that thread to the article at the top of this one, and the responses here. And my first comment in the last thread I shall repeat again.
Of the valid criticisms of you, your last two responses address not one single issue other than your words regarding Sarah Palin. And that amounted to no more than an additional slight dressed up as a retraction.
I, davidmhoffer, have serious doubts about Sarah Palin. It makes me uncomfortable to know that I am on the same side as Jerome Ravitz on this. Of course I say this only to show the complexity of the issue, this says more about me than it does about Jerome Ravitz.
So….anyone read that and have any doubt as to whom I have a lower opinion of, Palin or Ravitz?

psi says:
February 26, 2011 at 7:02 am
psi, your post is excellent, too. I’ve wondered about the links between PNS and post-modernism and you are very enlightening re. the latter. Perhaps I should be grateful that a series of really awful high-school English teachers scared me away from the subject.

I remember reading articles in once prestigious magazines arguing that we should take action on climate not because the science is clear, but because it isn’t. Had I not read your explanation of “Post Normal Science” on this blog, I would have thought it just a very odd leap of logic that coincidentally was mirrored in more than one journal. But I’d read your PNS theories, and having done so, recognized those articles for what they were. Nothing more than a justification for a political position with no facts to support it, and the spectre of fear (yes FEAR) of the unknown dressed up as some sort of next generation science. A new kind of science in which the frauds who demand action, having been exposed as frauds, can continue to demand action under a smokescreen of pseudo science called PNS. Nothing but a fraud to cover a fraud.
It was you, Dr. Ravetz, who urged taking action because the situation was urgent, the stakes high, the facts uncertain. But whose recommended actions did your attempt to convince the public that there was some sort of next generation science upon which to base decisions support? The fraudsters sir. Instead of demanding quality work from them, you provided a cleverly worded argument to instead implement their hysterical ravings as policy because despite their fraud, they might be right. You argued to give legitimacy to the shoddiest science in decades, perhaps centuries, and so advanced the arguments of the alarmists who could now with the pseudo science of PNS behind them, continue to push their case with NO SCIENCE AT ALL to justify their position.
For shame.

I still think, having read Funtowizc and Ravetz 1992 on PNS, that they do in fact point out some problems that are in fact relevant to the climate controversy.
They mention “elevating experts’ guesses to the status of scientific facts” and “how mathematics functions as a means for dogmatism and elitism, little changed in principle since the Pharaos”. Does this seem familiar? The mathematical sophistication of climate models posing as validity? I think they’ve aptly described some problems that we happen to see in the climate controversy, but are not new.
What they are lacking is a clear solution, but they coined a term (PNS) that looks like it’s supposed to be a solution, and most of the problems stem from that.

Re Bomber_the_Cat says:
February 26, 2011 at 6:29 am
David,
Describing a question as a “Child’s question” (4.14AM) and then failing to answer it does not does not really constitute a sound scientific argument. If the question is easy (which it isn’t) then answer it.
I did answer it…”Bomber it is a Childs question, and a quite insulting simplistic and false statement, the very words of which are not an attempt at dialogue. ““The mainstream estimate suggests that doubling CO2 from pre-industrial levels would increase global average temperatures by about 3C.” This is completely false. The premise is wrong and Connor knows it. The LWIR radiant effect from doubled CO2 is not 3 C, it is about 1C and all moderately informed proponets or skeptics of CAGW know this, including Connor. (Apparently you are not even moderately informed) This garbage premise shows complete lack of sincerity in dialogue.” Here was the answer Bomber…”Any one with minor knowledge knows the issue is feedbacks and other aspects of physics besides straight radiation, like cloud formation, location, and convection, and their affects on SWR and heat loss, evaporation and hydrologic system latent energy transport effects, etc, which can easily overwhelm the straight radiant CO2 effects.”
You did not like my answer, but it was a childs question, and a childish assumption that 3 C of warming results from a doubling of CO2, when most everyone knows it is far more involved then that. Dyson had already alluded to the complxity and lack of knowldge of the current state of science several times. Connor was neither listening or responding to the answers. It is almost like when Judith Curry finaly gave up on Gavin’s “Black Night” attack, and said to Gavin, “Brilliant Response”. My take was that she was actually giving up on him, saying words to the affect of the poem in “Hound of Heaven”, paraphrased here…
“Strange pitieous futile thing, wherefore should any set thee love apart, seeing none but I make much of naught, of all mankinds clotted clay, certainly thou hockeystick is the dingiest clot, shattered in shard on shard, shadow of Judit’s hand; outstrtched caressingly, ah fondest, blindest, weakest, the scientific method is what thou seekest.”
Such is the sad state of climate science today.

‘facts uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and decisions urgent”
———————————————-
Having spent my working life close up and personal with decisionmakers (politicians) and their advisers, please be advised – as we say – that almost all decisions are taken in that context, even now.
I don’t want to start a wargames discussion here. Elizabeth I and Philip had practically no information. Napoleon had bugger all maps. Let alone Alexander …
The fact is, political leaders have always functioned in the absence of certainty. That is their job. The notion that climate is somehow more important than Spain taking over the world, or Napoleon or Hitler taking over the world, is just an artefact.
The caravan is already moving on. But the harm at State and local levels will take many years to get rid of.

Galileo: “The conclusions of natural science are true and necessary, and the judgement of man has nothing to do with them.”
I do not know exactly where this discussion will end.
The political and philosophical aspects are inadequate in this debate.
Let the hateful thought experiment.
Ptolemy’s model (described using the language … …. PNS high degree of certainty.)
Kepler’s model (described using the language … … PNS high degree of certainty.)
The basic difference between the two models is simply where to place references. (or rearrange the system).
If the political and philosophical aspects are placed in this discussion. Necessarily the discussion starts to be another way.
This mode is not science, so naturally in the course of discussions the phrase “scientists say ….”. will be used to legitimize political agendas (I think that philosophers also contribute to the political agenda in the form of service … “according to the philosopher Ravetz …..).
It is common fact that scientists and philosophers are discarded when the answers provided by them are not exactly those that politicians wanted.
Of course no guarantee that will be well received by the other “side”

Paul Brassey said:
Dr. Curry recently posted on her blog, linked on WUWT, that members of the AGW “team” were “dishonest.” Famously, “team” members refer to AGW “skeptics” as “deniers” or “denialists.” None of these are scientific terms, but emotionally-charged, value-laden labels. Thus when Curry labels Schmidt “dishonest,” this enables Schmidt to puff up his righteous indignation and defend himself from an attack upon his character, rather than defend his scientific reasoning.
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Paul, there is a big difference (in scientific circles) between calling someone a ‘pinhead’ and describing them as dishonest.
Being described as dishonest is the worst accusation that can be made to a scientist. Someone being described as a ‘pinhead’ is more in the nature of banter over morning tea, or biologists scrapping about taxonomy.

I slogged through this article and the earlier one. I can’t say as I have come away with any greater understanding or enlightenment. At least the comments have been entertaining.

johanna;
I don’t want to start a wargames discussion here. Elizabeth I and Philip had practically no information. Napoleon had bugger all maps. Let alone Alexander …
The fact is, political leaders have always functioned in the absence of certainty. That is their job.>>>
Enjoyed your comments johanna, and support almost all except this one.
By current standards, those leaders had little information. But by the standards of the time, they had lots, and carefull reading of their historic victories invariably shows that superior information carried the battle in many cases. Alexander paid royaly for quality information from spies, and used it without mercy. The centre piece of Sun Tzu’s Art of War is the advantage gained by having superior information compared to your opponent.
And what did these legends of world history do when it came to light that through deliberate subterfuge or gross incompetance their trusted advisors had misinformed them?
Why that is in fact where the expression “heads will roll” comes from.
Eliminates the hazards of taking advice from that particular source, and makes certain that the remaining sources understand clearly that it is in their personal best interest to work to the highest possible standards.
Of course we’ve made much progress since medieval times. We no longer actually cut people’s heads off. Now, guided by the enlightenment of PNS, we understand that these people are working on a completely different plane of existance that the great unwashed cannot comprehend, that we should not cut off their heads or fire them, we should instead give them all our money, give in to all their demands, and should it be demanded of us for the good of humanity, let them cut our heads off.
Perhaps the only thing saving us from these post medieval philosophers and their twisted world views that defy both fact and reason is that they are so divorced from reality, so completely governed by a reality that can be dealt with only through the written word, that even if we were to hand them the guillotine, they’d never figure out how to operate it.

Ravetz – “In the interwar period there were two distinguished scientists who involved themselves in public affairs, one on the far Left and other on the Right; they were J.D. Bernal and Michael Polanyi respectively. Their disagreements were urgent and profound. But they both loved science, and saw in it an example, imperfect but still real, of the ideal community of selfless sharing in which they believed.”
It’s now February 2011, how have you been able to make such a statement when your own discovery of Polanyi showed to him to be an insecure follower of fashion, science consensus, rather than the man of scientific integrity you present here?
You said, on May 30th 2010 at 9:48 pm:
“I recall discovering that Michael Polanyi believed that if a scientist advanced theories that didn’t fit with the ‘tacit knowledge’ of the field, the scientists were justified in dismissing him unheard.” http://enthusiamscepticismscience.wordpress.com/2010/03/05/revolutionary-science-post-normal-climate-science-and-neo-marxism/
So which is he? And knowing this about him, and knowing it for a long time, how do you justify presenting him as an example of Quaker moral values?
From that page, an examination of Hulme’s book and his attack on Singer and Avery – the defining feature of which is Hulme accusing these of precisely what he himself is doing, and the method employed by AGW promoters for quite some time now, the cloaking of real motive by pukkha scientific method sounding basis, including, Hulme says, “citations to peer-reviewed articles, deference to numbers, and adoption of technical terms”. And he claims for himself and AGWScience the antidote to such skullduggery which in actual fact, as we here know perfectly well, the skeptics use successfully against AGW: “deploying the machinery of scientific method allows us to filter out hypotheses … as being plain wrong.” Where Hulme puts Singer and Avery, insert all the manipulators of science data to fit the agenda of AGW ‘scientists’.
So, Dr Ravetz, two interesting technique on show here. In you as specimen example, giving us a straight forward falsehood by presenting Polyani as other than not even a pygmy standing on the shoulders of giants such as Newton and then hiding it, and yourself, in the shelter of the generally accepted moral standing of the Quakers, and, in Hulme as specimen, the oft seen technique of accusing scientists anti the AGWScience mangling for an agenda, which is the known characteristic rather of AGWscientists. (We here know that it’s the claims of AGWscientists which have proved to be wrong, corrupt and nonsensical through the looking glass imaginary.)
So, let me see if I now have a better understanding of what you’re pushing here.
Post Normal Science then is the death of real Science which is now deemed as irrelevant as revolutions and art and everything new determined impossible in the black hole of depression which is Post Modernism, PNS however differs in one respect.
It can still see the sliver of light at the event horizon and still desperately wants to survive being sucked into oblivion, and how better to do this then by taking control of the lives of others to counter its lack of creativity in itself and whatever other depressing lack its adherents add to the black hole it is; blaming the other for its own lack of integrity, moral and scientific, and meaninglessness of life. Instead of the Post Rational depressive’s way out of suicide as the only rational alternative we now have it replaced by the positive thinking PNS way out of petty insecure tyrants, the destruction of those who point out that this philosophy is still bereft of value are added to the list of those to be considered superfluous numbers to a ‘sustainable ecology’ by it masquerading as the holder of true value judgement and to be achieved by the tried and tested method of generating fear and urgency.. So what’s new about PNS..?
And whence your mantram of ‘science is value’: it has none, as Hulme so clearly demonstrates the technique to those familiar with it, as the majority here are, regardless how cleverly you misappropriate the values of others by using their terms which have specific meaning for them.
And hence?

Here at WUWT Jerome Ravetz has provided his view of; AGW, science, philosophy of science, history of science and of his advocated PNS. For that, we can thank him sincerely.
Let’s applaud him for bringing his thinking to us in person.
I profoundly disagree with him at virtually every essential point.
NOTE to tallbloke – if you are monitoring this, I sincerely suggest that you could help Mr. Ravetz by doing pre-edits of his postings. I think you have a collegial relationship with him so it may be possible for you to provide some editing support for him. I am saying this to you in good will because I respect you from your openness and energy here in past years at WUWT. I think you have a collegial relationship with him so it may be possible for you to provide some editing support for him. With your editing help perhaps he would then come across as less of a pedantic academic with a condescending tone.
John

davidmhoffer says:
February 26, 2011 at 11:29 pm
Devastating.
I betcha he resembles that! 😉

Bomber-the-Cat
I think Professor Dyson was right to end the debate when he did because Connor’s final statement contained false claims: – “One of the problems I have with the climate “sceptics” is that they keep changing their arguments. First they say that there is no such thing as global warming, thereby dismissing all the many thousands of records of land and sea temperatures over the past century or so. Then they say that carbon dioxide emissions are not causing the Earth to warm up, thereby defying basic physics”.
Every single assertion in those three sentences is untrue. You cannot debate with someone whose method of argument is to accuse his opponent of something he is not guilty of.

Dave Springer says:
February 26, 2011 at 8:32 am

A comprehensively brilliant, and brilliantly comprehensive, post.
In Other Words, I agree with you completely!
😉

Thankyou Mr Ravetz for your thoughtful post. I particularly find sympathy with the comment.
“The big policy question is whether there is enough strength of evidence for AGW to justify the huge investments that would be required to do something about it.”
For myself the strength of the evidence is weak not because of a single issue, but relies on a chain of poorly supported conjectures and assumptions. The weaknesses and uncertainties are compounded, so plausible arguments on their own become implausible when stacked together. To maintain the looming catastrophe requires a number of extreme positions.
However, the justification of a mitigation policy is not the end of the matter. The policies are about inflicting a high cost now to avoid a much greater cost in the future. Yet there is no evaluation as to how the theoretical policy instruments can be translated into successful, cost efficient, outcomes. Indeed, the current polarization of the debate means that exaggerated claims of looming disaster are listened to, but calmer voices are either ignored, or denounced as deniers of the truth. So even if the diagnosis were correct, we end up proscribing [prescribing? Robt] an untested medicine that is both ineffective as a treatment and potentially more harmful than the disease.
I attempt, fairly inadequately, to chart the policy problems at
http://manicbeancounter.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/climate-change-in-perspective-%e2%80%93-part-2-of-4-the-mitigation-curve/

This is almost as good as an Ayn Rand novel! PNS with it’s ineffable revelations. The establishment of a “State Science Institute” whose only practical invention is a device to control the population – “for it’s own good”. This is an object lesson. Learn from it.
Atlas is going to shrug. Defund ALL government “science”. You cannot fix what is a fundamental flaw.
PR

I’m sorry Dr. Revitz, but I think you have completely misconstrued Dr. Dyson’s reason for cancelling the interview. Dyson told Conners he was tired of Conners’ refusal to think about Dyson’s answers. Dyson was being interviewed by an idiot and he as much said so in his own way.
I really don’t think there is any intellectual comparison of the two, and Dyson was not running out of arguments, but was tired of an inferior trying to get him to run in circles.

Dave Worley:
It is argued that psychotherapy is not a scientific practice, but it appears that for some among us it may be the only hope.
Yep, even unsarcastically, Ravetz’s PNS involving “facts uncertain, values in conflict, stakes high, urgent action required”, can easily be seen simply as a description of Ravetz’s own state of mind, a dysfunctional one having nothing to do with reality, but only to Ravetz’s personal reaction to reality and his failure to be able to rationally deal with it himself, alone in the same way everyone is.
Then his vaunted PNS simply acts to try to intentionally reify or bring about the same state of mind in others, also reinforcing his own, by the complete lack of virtue of its own methods which are the state of mind, therefore conveniently “proving” that a “Ravetz PNS” state of mind does reflect reality by some kind of “perception is reality” consensus or vote, and which also puts people like Ravetz in charge of what everyone else must do, including being able to force them to do it as in “might makes right”.
The parallel which makes or sees PNS as nothing more than an externalized obsessive-compulsive neurosis – such as incessant hand washing or anorexia nervosa, practiced in order for the person to obtain some control over something in regard to which the person thinks they have nothing else that “works”, or over something which they can’t even define – is really too great to ignore, and which we would do at our own peril.