From the ‘truth is stranger than fiction department’, reporting from San Francisco at the AGU Fall Meeting
ED11D-02
Professional Ethics for Climate Scientists
Monday, December 15, 201408:15 AM – 08:30 AM Moscone South 102
Several authors have warned that climate scientists sometimes exhibit a tendency to “err on the side of least drama” in reporting the risks associated with fossil fuel emissions. Scientists are often reluctant to comment on the implications of their work for public policy, despite the fact that because of their expertise they may be among those best placed to make recommendations about such matters as mitigation and preparedness. Scientists often have little or no training in ethics or philosophy, and consequently they may feel that they lack clear guidelines for balancing the imperative to avoid error against the need to speak out when it may be ethically required to do so. This dilemma becomes acute in cases such as abrupt ice sheet collapse where it is easier to identify a risk than to assess its probability. We will argue that long-established codes of ethics in the learned professions such as medicine and engineering offer a model that can guide research scientists in cases like this, and we suggest that ethical training could be regularly incorporated into graduate curricula in fields such as climate science and geology. We recognize that there are disanalogies between professional and scientific ethics, the most important of which is that codes of ethics are typically written into the laws that govern licensed professions such as engineering. Presently, no one can legally compel a research scientist to be ethical, although legal precedent may evolve such that scientists are increasingly expected to communicate their knowledge of risks. We will show that the principles of professional ethics can be readily adapted to define an ethical code that could be voluntarily adopted by scientists who seek clearer guidelines in an era of rapid climate change.
source: https://agu.confex.com/agu/fm14/meetingapp.cgi#Paper/11679
h/t to Steve Milloy
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‘Several authors have warned that climate scientists sometimes exhibit a tendency to “err on the side of least drama” in reporting the risks associated with fossil fuel emissions.’
Is it more ethical to err on the side of drama? IOW, should climate scientists tend towards hysteria, choosing that as the more ethical approach?
Maybe we shouldn’t complain, it appears Dr. Mann now realizes ethics does not pertain to his chosen field. (Well, he’s saying it now but he’s known it for awhile). More significant is his pretense that medical/ engineering ethics might be useful to guide the ethics-free climate scientist. (I say pretense because Mann surely is not really proposing to constrain his own conduct, instead he is paying respect to ethics just as the hypocrite pretends to respect the good). And he’s not proposing to apply his (absence of) ethics to medicine and engineering. Imagine your doctor prescribing the most expensive surgery now to counter the future risk of ebola, or your engineer requiring you to build your greenhouse underground due to risk of asteroid hit.
Briefly OT, this morning newspaper has AP story that rising temp reduces economic growth, very sciency, new statistical technique and everything. Photo with article shows roofer in AZ dated July 25. Article does not perceive the grand irony: Climate activists demand we kill economy now to avoid possibility of killing it in future. Good to know that the roofer’s productivity fell off precipitously when it went from 112F to 113F.
I hear they’ve also nailed down Charles Manson to give a lecture on population control.
“Was that wrong? Should I not have done that? I tell you, I gotta plead ignorence on this thing, because if anyone had said anything to me at all when I first started here that that sort of thing is frowned upon…”
[ ?? .mod]
george costanza from seinfeld…right after his boss confronted him for sleeping with a member of the custodial staff…
Now there’s someone that’ll fit right in with Mann and the team of ethics instructors.
Although George’s ethical standards could be somewhat difficult for the team to achieve.
Mann “knows” ethics and what passes for exemplary behavior in the scientific community:
“I’m very pleased to learn that Peter [Gleik] has been exonerated,” – http://www.politico.com/morningenergy/0612/morningenergy513.html . As has been commented above, it’s a disservice to attendees that Gleick will not impart his wisdom on ethical “considerations” one needs to forgo when transitioning from research to activism.
But even his employer – Penn State – has exemplified Mann’s ethical magnificence when it boldly proclaimed, “Clearly, Dr. Mann’s reporting of his research has been successful and judged to be outstanding by his peers [like Gleick]. This would have been impossible had his activities in reporting his work been outside of accepted practices in his field [like Gleick’s practices].” – http://www.psu.edu/ur/2014/fromlive/Final_Investigation_Report.pdf .
Why, in the sentence immediately preceding the quote above, Penn State promotes prominently the fact that Mann won the 2007 Nobel Peace Price for his highly scrutinized work in the field of climate science. How could an unethical person ever win such an award…? Obviously, the could not.
Therefore, Mann is the man for any and every lecture on ethics… What… ever.
That a professional organization has to be told how to be ethical (by Mike Mann, no less!) is really all you need to know about the AGU…
I hope it’s scheduled to immediately follow Al Gore’s lecture on “Ethics for the left wing”.
Me reading about Michael Mann giving professional ethics lectures for climate scientists reminded me of my wife’s experience in a drug rehab center.
A lot of drug rehab center counselors/therapists are ex-addicts – don’t know the percentage. My wife was a Physician Assistant who had a rotation at Eagleville, PA years ago, and stated that some of the staff were still doing drugs and doing therapy nonetheless.
I guess you don’t have to be ethically clean to give lecturers on the subject.
Don’t forget, the AGU gave an award to Gleick and had him as a speaker soon after Gleick-gate.
It’s worse than we thought with all this prickly ethics stuff to boot, so send more money.
Anybody remember Bizarro World from the old Superman comics? I believe that at birth baby Mann was switched with the baby Mann of Bizarro World. What other explanation could there be for Mann now lecturing on ethics? His Bizarro message could be summed up as —
Cheat and lie
And then deny
More seriously we are seeing Socialist ethics on display. The end justify the means. If you believe in a noble cause then all methods to win to it are justified. Or to put it another way —
Pie in the sky justifies forced labor camps.
Socialism drives out professionals and promotes party hacks. Look at our universities. They are filled with Socialist party hacks who got their jobs through a wink and a nod and not through intelligence and ability. The dumbing down of America began with the Socialist dumbing down of our colleges and universities.
Mann is totally Bizarro.
Eugene WR Gallun
.
Eugene WR Gallun
If every use of the word “socialist” in your post were replaced by the word “capitalist” then it may be possible to agree with your post.
But, of course, your post was intended as a thread bomb so was worded to be an untrue flame.
Richard
Thanks for the laugh, richard
Please list the US colleges and universities that are filled with capitalists instead of socialists, I’d like to send my daughter to one.
Hillsdale is a good place to start, Nancy.
I rarely disagree with you Dr. Courtney, but, in this case, you are flat wrong.
Friends:
Consider the real causes of problems if you really want to deal with the problems.
An inability or an unwillingness to think is demonstrated by assertions that issues are all the fault of socialists, or capitalists, or the left, or the right, etc..
Rational discussion is disrupted by making such assertions because they are without foundation and enrage those ‘on the receiving end’. This was clearly demonstrated by the responses to my post which merely pointed out the truth that the assertions of Eugene WR Gallun concerning “socialists” could be applied with equal accuracy to “capitalists”.
Richard
We can’t find any ethics for the last decade, and it’s a travesty that we can’t. Now I finally get it.
Laughing out loud
Our next guestt: Madoff
on The Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct for investment professionals
Stay tuned!
It is a topic he has to have read about in the online and popular presses, surely. My guess is he will liberally cite Dr. Curry’s work in this area. Truthfully I’m more interested in reviewing his references than his interpretation of what they mean. He’s bound to get something upside down along the way and I prefer to read about first-hand experiences rather than a rehash of what others have done. I do wonder if Dr. Muller of BEST will read it. He’s another who’d best remain silent on the topic of ethics.
Climate ethics must be like business ethics, as exemplified in this joke:
“A father is explaining business ethics to his son, who is about to go into business. “Suppose a woman comes in and orders a hundred dollars worth of material. You wrap it up, and you give it to her. She pays you with a $100 bill. But as she goes out the door you realize she’s given you two $100 bills. Now, here’s where business ethics come in: should you or should you not tell your partner?” (Henny Youngman)
Would be good if they’d give out copies of ‘The Baloney Detector’ as part of the lecture.
Maybe slip it into the slide show while rigging up the music mentioned upthread.
Why do you give this man, or anything connected to him, any media coverage?
Because it needs to be shown what a corrupt hellhole government science has become.
So they are reluctant to sound the alarm? Best placed to make recommendations?
Is this for real? Are you sure you weren’t reading The Onion?
Holy Crap!
We could use a good cartoon of the Three Faces of Eve in climate science.
No mistake here. Dr. Mann embodies the ethics of the whole Nobel-winning crowd.
First hide the decline, now hide the ethics.
First they have to find them. Next milk carton though. Still need to find climate change.
Yeah, run around in circles screaming the sky is falling NOW NOW NOW is to “err on the side of least drama.” You can’t make this stuff up can you? Reality is stranger than any fiction writer could imagine.
Gleick and Mann should give a keynote address to the entire AGU. That organization proves once again that its “ethical” standards are in the toilet!
On a cheerier note, my 9yo daughter and her friends very much enjoyed the family-event pre-conference yesterday, it was great to see her deeply engaged well beyond the attention span I customarily credit her with…
Perhaps this lecture will be entitled “Ethics how to have none and still get away with it ”
A guide to user poor science and worse mathematics to win a Noble Prize.