Follow the money. It’s not a game to these folks.
Climate change where you’d least expect it
by Philippa Martyr at Quadrant Online
In case you hadn’t realised the seriousness of the problem, I thought I’d share these budding projects with you. Names of grantees and institutions have been omitted to protect the innocent, but I have included the FOR, or Field of Research as coded by the ARC, and the total grant monies. Enjoy.
Physiology: “Abrupt environmental changes can put natural populations at risk of extinction. The project will show to what extent individuals can compensate for temperature changes and thereby render populations resilient to climate change. This research will make theoretical advances and improve the power to predict impacts of future climate change.” ($370,000)
Civil Engineering: “This project will develop innovative light gauge steel roofing systems with considerably increased wind resistance and reliable design rules for cold-formed steel codes worldwide. It will contribute to the Australian government’s goal of increasing building resilience against future extreme and more frequent wind events caused by climate change.” ($320,000)
Public Health and Health Sciences: “This study will investigate the effects of extreme heat, increasing temperatures and consequences of climate change, on the population health of rural communities in South Australia. Findings will inform adaptation strategies to prevent an increase in heat-associated and climate change-associated morbidity and mortality in rural areas.” ($122,000 – 2 years)
Political Science: “Commonsense says that claims about how social and political life ought to be arranged must not make infeasible demands. This project will investigate this piece of commonsense and explore its implications for a number of pressing issues, such as climate change, multiculturalism, political participation, inequality, historical justice, and the rules of war.” ($408,587)
Sociology: “We know very little about the ways food security is governed in Australia. This study – the first social-science based study of food security in the nation -will allow us to understand how a multiplicity of agencies come together to ensure the delivery of food, especially at a time of climate change impacts.” ($100,000 – 2 years)
Psychology: “Climate change represents a moral challenge to humanity, and one that elicits high levels of emotion. This project examines how emotions and morality influence how people send and receive messages about climate change, and does so with an eye to developing concrete and do-able strategies for positive change.” ($197,302)
Journalism and Professional Writing: “This project will examine the use of news management or ‘spin’ by Australian governments. Is it a legitimate tool of government in the face of a hyper-adversarial news media or a technique which undermines democracy? It will examine ‘spin’ in connection with policies on climate change, economic policy, indigenous policy and asylum seekers policy.” ($95,000)
Literary Studies: “The project will devise and develop a new ‘cultural materialist’ paradigm for science fiction studies and apply it to a case study of science fictional representations of catastrophe, especially nuclear war, plague and extreme climate change.” ($239,000)
Historical Studies: “This project will produce a comprehensive new biography of H.V. Evatt, High Court judge, minister in the 1940s, President of the United Nations General Assembly and leader of the Australian Labor Party opposition during the 1950s. Evatt’s life resonates with modern challenges both of liberty in a time of terror, and of internationalism in a time of global warming.” ($185,000)
{well almost a perfect score, climate change is just another code word for global warming}
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Take what you have and use it to justify taking more of what you have. (And not just money.)
Is there some method to do a word frequency search of the grant texts over a period of time? I’ll wager you’d see a lot of trends which correspond to whatever was “hot” at the time.
Some years ago a researcher published a word for word application to a university or government for a grant – The key words were to prove that climate change was caused by man.
I have tried to find that article or paper unsuccessfully.
Perhaps some of the WUWT commentators can come up with a copy of such a application or contract?
It would prove useful to support the article.
Art: I plan to paint a lot of paintings, this helps me relax from the stress of global warming.
Cheep at ($50,000 one year. )
I had to fix the header for you…
“In case you hadn’t realised the seriousness of the problem, I thought I’d share these budding projects with you. Names of grantees and institutions have been omitted to protect the
innocentguilty, but I have included the FOR, or Field of Research as coded by the ARC, and the total grant monies. Enjoy.”There you are! All better now! Hand out those grants!
Some managed to mention “climate change” twice. They deserve a bonus.
I love the 400 k for Political Science research. Ok, I know, I know, you have to wine and dine a lot, learn to say “climate change” and “sustainable development” without flinching (1), subcontract some research to climate scientists for adequate results, make press meetings in posh hotels, wine and dine more.
1 – Other must learn to say the easier cyclopentaneperhydrophenantrene. Which is why they’re paid less 🙂
*sigh* – many of my friends suggested to me that if I had added “climate change” to my PhD proposals, no matter how spurious the link, I would have got funding 10 years ago….looks like they were right.
These are extremely important projects, after all without this type funding how would the media come up with such headlines as
“Climate could kill you, Outback towns are told”
UK Independent Environment headline on 13th July on an Australian report which looks remarkably similar to the “public Health and health Sciences” project
What has the old commo Doc Evatt got to do with Global Warming? The world was heading for an Ice Age when he died.
Clear evidence that Big Climate is the established market leader in gouging funding from Government . Forget about the Industrial-Military Complex, they are now completely in the shade of the Green Left Lobby-Academic Complex.
To paraphrase that great scene in The Shipping News: now – “World Threatened by Deadly Climate Change”, not to distant future ( when the drugs have worn off) – “World Saved from deadly Climate Change”. The MSM and academia will milk the angle du jour for all they can. They have abandoned the legacy of the Enlightenment and have adopted the paradigm that its all just Entertainment.
Stealing Graham Greens idea (sorry for that)
Baseball is a elegant game played in the warm air of spring, summer and fall. CLIMATE CHANGE can have a devastating impact on the quality of play. This threat to our national pastime must be quantified. Traveling to games at each of the 30 parks several times a year for several years in order to get e quality N-value is essential to the success of this very important project. ($5,000,000) and renewable a maximum of 20 times should about do it for me, I mean this research project.
Climate change can affect the quality of people’s leisure time. This project will assess the potential impact of climate on the usability of the World’s top 20 most popular beaches. In particular we will investigate the impact of climate change on the ability of personnel to transport cold cocktails from beachside bars to the customer reclining on the beach.
Philippa, have no idea what is it you have against “spreading the wealth around”
Corrupt and corrupting. Why are the decision makers who allocate these grants not held accountable? I expect climate change is not the only bias they display?
I think Graham Green and RobW are on to something with the sports studies, although I think studying projected growth in the popularity of beach volleyball in a warmer world is a potential winner. I would like to augment this basic analysis with personal research in the efficacy of various beverages in maintaining optimum hydration and attitude.
Maybe Anthony or some-one could set up an Imaginary ‘Climate Research Fund’ of X million and see what scammers apply.
I’m sure readers on here would come up with beautiful rejection letters.
[REPLY: Interesting idea, but maybe you would like to think the whole concept through again? Borat we are not. -REP]
katabasis1 says:
July 24, 2012 at 1:57 pm
*sigh* – many of my friends suggested to me that if I had added “climate change” to my PhD proposals, no matter how spurious the link, I would have got funding 10 years ago….looks like they were right.
=========================================================================
No. Funding or not, you would have been wrong if you had….Unless you were studying the effects of broken Hockey Sticks on the changing climate of Global Warming.
Actually in one of those cases it’s quite apt to include climate change:
Yep, political spin and climate change go hand in hand. Though I still can’t see much good coming from the paper so spare me the expense.
I just love “hyper adversarial media” in the journalism grant. Do you Aussies have a media challenging the government line about climate change rather than cheer-leading for more government to solve the problem? We have some adversarial internet and talk radio media in the U.S.A. but most of the traditional media will only turn adversarial if the Dem’s lose in November.
(I didn’t need to change it much. The means have changed, the end goal is the same.)
To the tune of: “The Times They Are A-Changin'”
Come gather ’round funders
Wherever you roam
I’ll say that the waters
Around you have grown
And tell ‘em that soon
They’ll be drenched to the bone
If Ma Gaia to them’s
Not worth savin’
Then they better start swimmin’
Unless they give you the throne
For the climate we’ll claim is changin’.
Come writers and Marxist
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your lies comin’
The chance won’t come again
And hype Super Moons
Give normal weather a spin
And there’s no tellin’ who
That you’re foolin’
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the climate we’ll claim is changin’.
Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway
Don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There’s a battle outside
And it is ragin’
It’ll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the climate we’ll claim is changin’.
Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don’t criticize
What only we understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your fuel bill is
Rapidly risin’
Please get out your wallet
And hand over your cash
For the climate we’ll claim is changin’.
The stick it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin’
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the climate we’ll claim is changin’.
Only $200? Pikers.
All I gotta say…………
along with Gunga Din’s excellent parody of Dylan [July 24, 2012 at 6:22 pm] suggests to me that …
With sincere apologies to the late, great Janis Joplin … should the above not read “… climate change is just another phrase for nothin’ left to lose …”?!
OK, OK … I’ll get my coat!
It took me a long time to appreciate the throwaway comments in research proposals. The civil engineering proposal is a great example. The devils food cake: “This project will develop innovative light gauge steel roofing systems with considerably increased wind resistance and reliable design rules for cold-formed steel codes worldwide.” And then there is the throwaway (the frosting): “It will contribute to the Australian government’s goal of increasing building resilience against future extreme and more frequent wind events caused by climate change.”
Better wind resistance and design rules are sufficient – period. I expect that climate change is only mentioned in the introduction of the proposal and the abstract. “Climate change” is the cause du jour that has political clout.
I don’t know the details of the Australian funding process. In the US, however, the program managers at NSF, DOE, NIST, DOD, NASA, etc. look for good science and engineering. In addition, a program manager will also look at current affairs for the popular causes that they can sell to the political class that funds the agency.
Including the throwaway is one small additional step to getting funding. I eventually worked with a great engineering manager that pointed this out to me when I put together a proposal for improved tooling materials. And what does a carbide drill have to do with climate change (global warming)? Well, a better drill will cut faster and use less energy. And less energy (electricity) will require burning less coal producing less of that evil carbon dioxide. Multiply that saving per hole by the total number of holes drilled each year, and we are well on the way to saving the planet.