Guest essay by Wim Rost
Sometimes you know that something “stinks” somewhere. But you don’t know what and you don’t know where. You can search everywhere and don’t find it. Till you finally find out.
Until recently I thought about the IPCC as an organisation “filled up with science”. That thought was both right and wrong. Sure, you can find a lot of scientists and scientific results there, but, IPCC does not (necessarily) work as science. No, it is not science, IPCC is government.
I discovered the importance of that difference by reading a title of an IPCC report twice: “Summary for Policymakers” and “Summary for Policymakers”. That title was giving me the suggestion that scientists had been writing a scientific paper for Policymakers. But, looking further I discovered it was different. That summary was not a scientific paper. It was an opinion and it does not need to be the opinion of all scientists involved*. Let me explain.
Scientists have to respect the scientific method. The scientific method has rules. The most important of all rules is to work in a way to obtain maximum objectivity. “Science or Fiction” wrote about objective science in a post with reference to Karl Popper: https://dhf66.wordpress.com/2015/06/02/ippc-does-exactly-what-should-be-avoided-in-objective-science/ . In the words of Karl Popper:
“We may now return to a point made in the previous section: to my thesis that a subjective experience, or a feeling of conviction, can never justify a scientific statement, and that within science it can play no part (…). No matter how intense a feeling of conviction it may be, it can never justify a statement. Thus I may be utterly convinced of the truth of a statement; certain of the evidence of my perceptions; overwhelmed by the intensity of my experience: every doubt may seem to me absurd. But does this afford the slightest reason for science to accept my statement? Can any statement be justified by the fact that Karl R. Popper is utterly convinced of its truth? The answer is, ‘No’; and any other answer would be incompatible with the idea of scientific objectivity.”
Is a conviction the slightest reason for science to accept a statement? Popper: “The answer is, ‘No’; and any other answer would be incompatible with the idea of scientific objectivity.”
In the IPCC Climate Discussion at this point all went wrong: conviction. But how? As said, it has been a struggle for me to discover. But now I know how we all are tricked. We are tricked in sentences like “Summary for Policymakers”. And also by way of “organising a result” in a manner which is perhaps formally correct – within the IPCC context – but as a result gives a wrong suggestion to the big public. Namely, the suggestion of “scientific evidence”, supported by nearly all scientists.
“The Summary for Policymakers 2014” of group II has a subtitle: “WORKING GROUP II CONTRIBUTION TO THE FIFTH ASSESSMENT REPORT OF THE INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE”. From the scientific point of view “Working group II contribution” to the summary is not correct as far as I can see.
To be scientific, the statement that something – for example an opinion or a conclusion – is a“working group II contribution” has to be tested and verified. So there must have been an enquiry among the scientists that were working in the group involved, in any case of a statement with expressions as “likely” or “very likely” or in any other statement or conclusion which is not straight from scientific research itself. That enquiry must make clear which of the scientists involved did judge the presented statement to be “a certitude” from the scientific point of view. This enquiry and the results have to be publicly available in order to make it verifiable. It must be possible to make the enquiry again and then we must get the same results. By doing so [parts of] the enquiry can be verified by researchers and journalists.
I have never heard about such an enquiry by the IPCC in regard to summaries or conclusions.
When the hypothesis (e.g. “X = very unlikely”) is not tested in such a way, you can only refer to such a statement as to the opinion of the writers of that specific part. But, opinion is not the same as “science” and every suggestion that the summary or conclusion is representing the science or even the scientists of “working group II” has to be avoided. Unless it is proven.
The IPCC is stating elsewhere:
The assessment process
This Working Group III contribution to the AR5 represents the combined efforts of hundreds of leading experts in the field of climate change mitigation and has been prepared in accordance with the rules and procedures established by the IPCC.
(WR: italic is mine)
Source: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg3/ipcc_wg3_ar5_full.pdf
That was an eye opener. Does this statement mean that rules and procedures of science and of experts are used to produce summary’s and conclusions? No, not at all. It means, that what you are reading in the summaries and the conclusions is IPCC. And IPCC, although a lot of important work is done by scientists, IPCC is not equal with science. The IPCC is an intergovernmental panel on Climate Change. To be even more clear: IPCC is government and not science. And the workers of the IPCC prepare the work in accordance with the rules and procedures established by the IPCC.
In order to be scientific the scientific method has to be adhered. The use of many scientists to fill important parts of IPCC reports does not mean that everything is science. A report is just a report. In this case, a report from the IPCC. And the IPCC is (inter-) government. Scientists involved can produce their own scientific papers about their own specialised part of science, but a small group of writers writes the summaries and the conclusions – for the IPCC. And IPCC is government.
When you are reading well, formally the IPCC knows. But, the problem is that in public use the fact that a lot of scientists are working for the IPCC is mentioned so often, that it seems that everything produced by the IPCC is “scientific”. But, the summaries and conclusions are not scientific. They are just representing the intergovernmental opinion.
Of course, government may have an opinion. And government may also find support for that opinion in scientific research. But by making choices for certain lines and by drawing certain conclusions – even when made with the help of scientists – this doesn’t mean the government is representing “Science” and that her conclusions are “Science” or even “scientific”. It could very well be, that another choice for the IPCC‘s stated mission**, another choice of writers, another choice for “process organisers” and another selection of scientists would have delivered other summaries and other conclusions. As is usual when it is about an opinion.
The ‘big lie’ about the scientific nature of all of the IPCC statements and especially her conclusions has to end up by strictly avoiding the overwhelming suggestion that everything is science. Unless there are enquiries which prove the opposite. Therefore, to start with the next report the IPCC should give reports titles and subtitles like:
Summary by Policymakers
Approved by governments, not science
As a beginning. And to continue, they have to make everywhere a strict division between “science” and “opinion”. And tell with every statement who’s opinion it exactly is.
Wim Röst ***
* Of course there always remains the possibility that at a certain moment one specific researcher is more right than the other 99.9% of researchers which “are not that far”. Think about Albert Einstein’s E=mc2 or Alfred Wegener’s Continental Drift. So, majority doesn’t count in science. “Reigning by majority” is a democratic principle which is bound to government and not to science. The IPCC is government and so uses “majorities”. But, from the scientific point of view, “majority” is without any meaning and doesn’t belong to Science.
** “The IPCC’s stated mission is not to discover what accounts for climate change, but to assess “the risk of human-induced climate change.” Consequently, there is almost no discussion in its lengthy reports of other theories of climate change. Policymakers and journalists took this to mean the AGW theory was the only credible theory of climate change, and the IPCC’s sponsors and spokespersons had no incentive to correct the mistake.”
Source: https://www.heartland.org/sites/default/files/7theories-web.pdf
*** The article above has to be read as my personal opinion.
With regards to commenting: please adhere to the rules known for this site: quote and react, not personal
Our societies are prosperous because of our science and technology. Nothing else. For that, scientific research had to be independent in its long search for “the truth”.
There is nothing so complicated as the truth behind the very complex system of earth’s climates. Physics, biology, chemistry, geography, paleoclimatology, astronomy, economy, sociology and more sciences are involved. Full freedom of research is needed and respect for all “other thinking”. As was usual in science.
Science needs to retake her independence in research and has to take the lead in publishing the real knowledge about “science and the climate”. Then I mean, the complete scientific knowledge. Science requires that every scientist is heard and his / hers ideas are seriously commented.
Note the year of Lindzen’s article in the WSJ – 2001.
Note also that none of the scary predictions of the IPCC have materialized.
The IPCC has a negative predictive track record; so no one should believe them.
Regards, Allan
Wall Street Journal
June 11, 2001
http://eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/OpEds/LindzenWSJ.pdf
Scientists’ Report Doesn’t Support the Kyoto Treaty
By Richard S. Lindzen
Excerpt:
The full IPCC report is an admirable description of research activities in climate science, but it is not specifically directed at policy. The Summary for Policymakers is, but it is also a very different document. It represents a consensus of government representatives (many of whom are also their nations’ Kyoto representatives), rather than of scientists. The resulting document has a strong tendency to disguise uncertainty, and conjures up some scary scenarios for which there is no evidence.
Science, in the public arena, is commonly used as a source of authority with which to bludgeon political opponents and propagandize uninformed citizens. This is what has been done with both the reports of the IPCC and the NAS. It is a reprehensible practice that corrodes our ability to make rational decisions. A fairer view of the science will show that there is still a vast amount of uncertainty — far more than advocates of Kyoto would like to acknowledge — and that the NAS report has hardly ended the debate. Nor was it meant to.
*******************************
I am awaiting sound research showing the optimum climate for our present biosphere. But most “research” is really an attempt to secure the optimum level of government research funding.
It is no surprise that almost every demand made by advocates of Anthropogenic Global Warming (er, now “climate chage”) converges on bigger government, higher taxes, less freedom and more restrictions. That tells me all I need to know about this massive fraud.
Hi Buck,
This is excerpted from some of my recent work.
Contrary to popular belief, Earth is colder-than-optimum for human survival. A warmer world, such as was experienced during the Roman Warm Period and the Medieval Warm Period, is expected to lower winter deaths and a colder world like the Little Ice Age will increase winter mortality, absent adaptive measures. These conclusions have been known for many decades, based on national Excess Winter Mortality statistics.
Excess Winter Mortality in the USA typically totals about 100,000 per year – that is, 100,000 Excess Winter Deaths every year during the cold months of December through March.
In Canada, Excess Winter Deaths range from about 5000 to 10,000 every year.
Regards, Allan
Post Script: The above is true even in warm countries such as Brazil, Thailand and Australia..
PPS: Also contrary to popular belief, atmospheric CO2 concentrations are not dangerously high, they are dangerously low.
Wim Rost:
You say
I am surprised that you did not cite, quote or reference the pertinent IPCC document because that would have strengthened your case substantially.
The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) only exists to produce documents intended to provide information selected, adapted and presented to justify political actions. The facts are as follows.
It is the custom and practice of the IPCC for all of its Reports to be amended to agree with its political summaries. And this is proper because all IPCC Reports are political documents although some are presented as so-called ‘Scientific Reports’.
Each IPCC Summary for Policymakers (SPM) is agreed “line by line” by politicians and/or representatives of politicians, and it is then published. After that the so-called ‘scientific’ Reports are amended to agree with the SPM. This became IPCC custom and practice when prior to the IPCC‘s Second Report the then IPCC Chairman, John Houghton, decreed,
This was done and has been the normal IPCC procedure since then.
This custom and practice enabled the infamous ‘Chapter 8′ scandal so perhaps it should – at long last – be changed. However, it has been adopted as official IPCC procedure for all subsequent IPCC Reports.
Appendix A of the most recent IPCC Report (the AR5) states this where it says.
This is completely in accord with the official purpose of the IPCC.
The IPCC does NOT exist to summarise climate science and it does not.
The IPCC is only permitted to say AGW is a significant problem because they are tasked to accept that there is a “risk of human-induced climate change” which requires “options for adaptation and mitigation” that can be selected as political polices and the IPCC is tasked to provide those “options”.
This is clearly stated in the “Principles” which govern the work of the IPCC.
These are stated at
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/ipcc-principles/ipcc-principles.pdf
Near its beginning that document says
This says the IPCC exists to provide
(a) “information relevant to understanding the scientific basis of risk of human-induced climate change”
and
(b) “options for adaptation and mitigation” which pertain to “the application of particular policies”.
Hence, its “Role” demands that the IPCC accepts as a given that there is a “risk of human-induced climate change” which requires “options for adaptation and mitigation” which pertain to “the application of particular policies”. Any ‘science’ which fails to support that political purpose is ‘amended’ in furtherance of the IPCC’s Role.
The IPCC achieves its “Role” by
1
amendment of its so-called ‘scientific’ Reports to fulfil the IPCC’s political purpose
2
by politicians approving the SPM
3
then the IPCC lead Authors amending the so-called ‘scientific’ Reports to agree with the SPM.
All IPCC Reports are pure pseudoscience intended to provide information to justify political actions; i.e.Lysenkoism.
Richard
Richard,
“You say
This Working Group III contribution to the AR5 represents the combined efforts of hundreds of leading experts in the field of climate change mitigation and has been prepared in accordance with the rules and procedures established by the IPCC .
I am surprised that you did not cite, quote or reference the pertinent IPCC document because that would have strengthened your case substantially.”
WR: In the original document I used tabs to say which words were not mine. Unfortunately the tab stops disappeared in the online version. Sorry. By using quotation marks instead of the tab stops in the above document there would have been written in the online version:
The IPCC is stating elsewhere:
“The assessment process
This Working Group III contribution to the AR5 represents the combined efforts of hundreds of leading experts in the field of climate change mitigation and has been prepared in accordance with the rules and procedures established by the IPCC.”
(WR: italic is mine)
Source: http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg3/ipcc_wg3_ar5_full.pdf
Wim
Thank you for that lucid account of the confirmation bias built into the IPCC reports by its very charter. Such bias is the very antithesis of the scientific method and its essential objectivity.
/Mr Lynn
Thanks for pointing that out. I was going to do if no one else did. The game is rigged. This is why it is accurate to say “the debate is over”. Any science contrary to AGW is unwelcome and probably very irritating for the Panel. The average citizen assumes the IPCC was constituted to evaluate the science to determine 1) if there is global warming, 2) if there is, what is causing it and 3) what should be done. A reasonable assumption, but greatly mistaken.
Not to worry. People much wiser than we have determined that Nation-states have outlived their usefulness and must be phased out in the interest of peace, fairness and the Earth. The transition is already well under way. Fear of AGW is to be the justification for the full implementation of the NWO. Facts, truth, science? I hope you are joking. In twenty years my generation of fossils which was taught to venerate the Constitution and the nation it was the foundation for will be gone. Perhaps it is all for the best.
Regarding the chapter 8 scandal, I had an idea that I should try to identify and count the logical and scientific fallacies in the reply from IPCC lead author Ben Santer to Seitz – but I gave up. There was too many:
http://research.greenpeaceusa.org/?a=download&d=3050
Anyone wanna try?
https://logfall.wordpress.com
Climate change is totally bogus This is all an attempt by govt to increase one regulation over their lives
The science does not support the BS being propagated by govt
Thank you Wim – for drawing attention to this important perspective on IPCC. I regard the failure to pay utmost respect to the integrity of the scientific method, as a fundamental, harmful and potentially dangerous failure by United Nations.
From my point of view, scientific objectivity, and the quest for truth, should be put first in an organization claiming to be scientific. More than that, a scientific organization should protect the integrity of the scientific process. The scientific process is precious, but also very vulnerable. It is a great disappointment to register that United Nations created a body (IPCC) governed by unscientific principles.
In my view there are two very central documents, governing the work by IPCC, in which there are principal failures:
1. Principles governing IPCC work
By which United Nations allowed IPCC to be governed by:
– the unscientific principle of a mission (§1)
– the unscientific principle of consensus (§10)
– an approval process and organization principle which must, by it´s nature, diminish dissenting views. (§11)
2. Guidance Note for Lead Authors of the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report on Consistent Treatment of Uncertainties
In this document, made up in a hasty way, IPCC made two very fundamental errors:
a) On qualitative statements:
IPCC endorsed subjective statements called «level of confidence» and enforced the use of such statements upon the lead authors:
b) On quantitative statements:
IPCC failed to recognize an international guideline for expression of uncertainty and adopted an unsatisfactory way of expressing uncertainty – by “likelihood”
And anyone believing that IPCC can be trusted to provide unbiased science should have a look at this post: IPCC was heavily biased from the very beginning
A body governed by the kind of principles governing IPCC, cannot be trusted on scientific matters.
(To avoid to many links in this comment. I just published an similar post to this comment, which contains links to the IPCC documents and the argument behind each of my claims:
Summary – On the governance of IPCC by unscientific principles! )
Most people understand that building on a lie is like building your castle on a sand foundation.
Tis my belief of late, that the COP21, the UN hysteria over CAGW is evidence for just how dangerous a corrupt civil service is to any nation.
CAGW highlights how low we fat and lazy citizens can sink.
Government is full of fools and bandits,
“The civil service exists to provide evidence based policy to politicians” One of Canada’s prominent leaches.
Yet everything about the UN IPCC wreaks of government, the output of preconceived ideas, supported by appeal to authority.
The IPCC is staffed by our bureaucrats, seconded to the UN,the policy based evidence manufacturing has taken place in country, by our civil servants.
The money has come straight from our tax dollars.
We do not need any more evidence of how systemically corrupt our governments have become.
Those towering national debts tell it all.
Now we are given proof that these “helpers” will collude at an international level to keep the stolen wealth rolling in, Taxing Air, priceless.
Welcome to international Kleptocracy.
Wim Röst,
You addressed . . . . science, subjectivity, objectivity, certainty, conviction, inference, politics, trust, Popper . . . .
One example of your focus,
Wim Röst , your lead post is a thought provoking one. It invokes important thoughts regarding the opposition between two climate focused science communities:
(1) Those who adhere to the subjective school of a particular philosophy of science that comes from a certain kind of philosophical perspective; they hold science as being a subjective servant to pre-science premises not sourced from science. Examples of the adherents are: a certain kind of politician; the IPCC Bureau’s intellectual leadership; the scientists supporting the creations of the IPCC’s ARs; and of course academics within some science and philosophy departments at universities.
versus
(2) Those who adhere to the objective school of a particular philosophy of science that comes from a certain kind of philosophical perspective; the hold science as being above and not dependent on only multiply independent verifications by unambiguous corroborated observations of reality.
The IPCC was predicated on the view of science in (1) above. It knew it could use the view of science in (2) above.
The critical fundamental question that must be answered is why does the view of science in (1) above exist at all much less why is it so widely accepted in the modern world of the 21st century. It is pre-renaissance and anti-enlightenment. The IPCC/ UN/ governments/ NGO’s/ environmentalists did not create it or cause it to be created, but utilized it. The only solution to stop it is persistently intellectually voiding the philosophies that justify the subjective school of the philosophy of science.
Regarding Popper as a proponent of the objective school, he actually is not very consistently so, unfortunately. He has roots in both philosophical pragmatism and analysis school of subjectivism. Better to go with Feynman. We can discuss this further on an appropriate thread.
John
This paragraph in my above comment needs correction – “(2) Those who adhere to the objective school of a particular philosophy of science that comes from a certain kind of philosophical perspective; the hold science as being above and not dependent on only multiply independent verifications by unambiguous corroborated observations of reality.”
The corrected paragraph should be,
John