By Larry Kummer. From the Fabius Maximus website.
Paul Krugman — Nobel Laureate economist, #5 on Prospect magazine’s 2015 list of the world’s top “thinkers” — gives us powerful advice about the climate policy debate in his August 12 NYT op-ed (similar to this from a February column). It is the standard doctrine for science, except in climate science.
Paul Krugman. Creative Commons license.
“Here’s how I would approach the issue: by asking how we know that a modeling approach is truly useful. The answer, I’d suggest, is that we look for surprising successful predictions. General relativity got its big boost when light did, in fact, bend as predicted. The theory of a natural rate of unemployment got a big boost when the Phillips curve turned into clockwise spirals, as predicted, during the stagflation of the 1970s.
“So has there been anything like that in recent years? …Were there any interesting predictions from … models that were validated by events?”
In fact Krugman is discussing his own field, macroeconomics — but this insight has deep roots in the philosophy of science and applies as well to climate science. Predictions are the gold standard for validating theories. In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
(1962) Thomas Kuhn described failed predictions that undermined dominant paradigms (e.g., the Michelson–Morley experiment) and successful predictions that helped establish new paradigms (e.g., the orbit of Mercury). He said…
“Probably {scientists’} most deeply held values concern predictions: they should be accurate; quantitative predictions are preferable to qualitative ones; whatever the margin of permissible error, it should be consistently satisfied in a given field; and so on.”
Karl Popper set the bar for validation even higher in Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge![clip_image002[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2016/08/clip_image0021.gif "clip_image002[1]"){kind=small}
(1963). This is what Krugman meant by a “surprising” prediction.
“Confirmations should count only if they are the result of risky predictions; that is to say, if, unenlightened by the theory in question, we should have expected an event which was incompatible with the theory — an event which would have refuted the theory.”
Krugman, drawing on this tradition, points us to a solution for the deadlock in the ever-more-bitter public policy debate about our response to climate change: look for predictions, then test them.
The great oddity of the climate science debate
“Ad hominem attacks aren’t a final line of defense, they’re argument #1. …It’s about an attitude, the sense that righteousness excuses you from the need for hard thinking and that any questioning of the righteous is treason.” {By Paul Krugman. Quite true, as any skeptic quickly learns when discussing climate with an activist.}
Activists consider forecasts of models as like the Word of God. Skeptics mutter about vast conspiracies of climate scientists. Lost in this futile decades-long debate is discussion about the methodological testing necessary to create confidence that the results of climate models provide an adequate basis for public policy decisions that shape the world economy.
The necessary tools are well understood, and routinely applied in other fields. For example drugs are tested by prior review of study proposals, followed by analysis of their results by paid non-affiliated multi-disciplinary teams of experts (neither of which is done in climate science). Best of all are successful predictions, and successful risky predictions (for outcomes contrary to expectations) create strong confidence. These hard-won insights have had little influence on climate science. See these posts for examples…
- Thomas Kuhn tells us what we need to know about climate science.
- Daniel Davies’ insights about predictions can unlock the climate change debate.
- Karl Popper explains how to open the deadlocked climate policy debate.
- Paul Kurgan talks about economics. Climate scientists can learn from his insights.
- Milton Friedman’s advice about climate models & how to win the policy debate.
- We must rely on forecasts by computer models. Are they reliable? (Many citations.)
So the bitter public policy debate rattles on, each side hoping for a brute-force political resolution that crushes the large fraction of the pubic that disagree with them. Perhaps that will happen, and perhaps that will produce a useful outcome. But we can do better.
Scientists could re-run older models with actual emissions, not projections, and comparing their forecasts with observed temperatures. These multi-decade predictions would provide objective, powerful data that might resolve the policy debate — or at least create a clear majority of public opinion for one side so we can move on.
- My proposal: Climate scientists can restart the climate change debate – & win.
- Putting this proposal in a wider context of science norms and the climate science literature.
This will not happen without public pressure. As we see in Campaign 2016, our ruling elites prefer to give us a circus — treating us like children to be entertained rather than citizens to be informed. But we can stand up and re-take the reins of America, re-shaping the debates about climate change and other key issues.
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Krugman shows that he still does not understand the scientific method.
Several times, we have been led astray by the desire to “corroborate” instead of conscientiously seek to refute conjectures/hypotheses/theories.
Repeatedly, his neo-Keynesianism has been refuted, and he’s focused on fabricating Freudian-like excuses and rationalizations rather than abandon the failed hypotheses.
When I am wrong, I am wrong. I must reject the failed theory and ask questions and try to propose another hypothesis, then turn it loose to be tested and critiqued.
Let’s take a peek at some of Krugman’s other thoughts that have been recently dissected for some perspective…..
https://mishtalk.com/2016/08/16/krugmans-arrow-theory-misses-target-by-light-years/#more-40165
What is bizarre and perhaps unique to “climate science” is that the claim that some spectral effect can “trap” energy on the side away from the source , 400K over a distance of a few hundred km in the case of Venus , has neither an enabling equation nor experimental demonstration to support it .
Injecting Paul Krugman into a science debate about global warming is a fundamental mistake. That is equivalent to throwing mud in the Olympic pool after it already has a green problem from a shortage of pool chemicals. That guy is a severely politicized economist in his own inexact science. You don’t need him to be a middle man for hard science methodology messaging when you can go there directly. His only purpose is to translate his brand of perpetual monetary stimulus into climate policy debate. Therefore he becomes a tool for carbon tax revenue to stimulate and redistribute again and under the new label of climate policy.
“That guy is a severely politicized economist in his own inexact science. You don’t need him to be a middle man for hard science methodology messaging when you can go there directly.”
Spot on!
That’s what I’m trying to say.
Krugman fits the bill precisely because he is not a “hard scientist”. Climate science is desperately in need of a few physicists to re-examine the trampeled ground (and try not to laugh) to arrive at conclusions and direction for future research, free of political influence or filtering. The present state of things is corrosive to the good name of science. Long past time the politicians butted out!
This “surprisingness” standard I have read about before, I can’t think of any good examples in which it has help convert adherents on one theory to another. In fact, the idea that a natural level of unemployment is bolstered by the ability of the Phillips curve to explain some observation seems pretty suspect when the 1970s appears to have set back the suitability of the Phillips curve itself as a tool.
The idea that a theory gains credibility by delivering correct, and previously unexpected results, seems fraught with problems. For instance, it suggests a standard of proof without reference to alternative explanations that provide equally surprising or even more surprising observations. How does one apply a weight to such evidence? What weight does one apply to a big “boost”?
The observation of the angular deflection of starlight was not unexpected, but was rather a consequence of theory that people designed experiments to test. Otherwise, what explanation is there for astronomers being in all those godforsaken places at the very moment of an eclipse?
What idiot even cares what ENRON ADVISOR Krugman spews?
The essence of this essay is that the predictive track record of the advocates in the global warming (CAGW) debate should decide who is correct and who is wrong. I agree with this premise.
The global warming alarmists have been consistently wrong, since none of their scary predictions have materialized. The warmists have perfect negative credibility to date.
Furthermore, that is ample evidence of unethical conduct by the warmists in the Climategate emails, the Mann hockey stick fiasco, the temperature data revisions, etc.
The climate skeptics have a much better predictive track record – below is our example from 2002. Our predictions were certainly “surprising” for that time and certainly “high-risk” – our co-author Dr. Sallie Baliunas was forced out of Harvard, allegedly by the current US President’s Chief Scientific Advisor and others – a shameful act and a great loss to the scientific community.
Regards to all, Allan MacRae, P.Eng.
Excerpts from past posts:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/08/12/the-moral-case-for-fossil-fuels/comment-page-1/#comment-2277431
[excerpt]
I have an excellent predictive track record, dating back to my first publications on this subject in 2002. In contrast, none of the scary predictions of the IPCC and the global warming gang have materialized – they have been consistently wrong.
The global warming gang have perfect negative credibility and yet they have caused our society to squander trillions of dollars of scarce global resources on a false crisis.
It is a professional and ethical obligation to speak out against such destructive nonsense.
Cheap abundant reliable energy is the lifeblood of society. When misinformed politicians fool with energy systems, innocent people suffer and die.
Regards, Allan
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/05/28/greens-blame-donald-trump-for-crumbling-paris-climate-accord/comment-page-1/#comment-2225581
[excerpt]
2002 DEBATE ON THE KYOTO ACCORD
Here is our predictive track record, from an article that Dr. Sallie Baliunas, Dr. Tim Patterson and I published in 2002 in our debate with the Pembina Institute on the now-defunct Kyoto Accord.
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/KyotoAPEGA2002REV1.pdf
Our eight-point Rebuttal includes predictions that have all materialized in those countries in Western Europe that have adopted the full measure of global warming mania. My country, Canada, was foolish enough to sign the Kyoto Protocol, but then was wise enough to ignore it.
[Our 2002 article is in “quotation marks”, followed by current commentary.]
1. “Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
NO net global warming has occurred for more than 18 years despite increasing atmospheric CO2.
2. “Kyoto focuses primarily on reducing CO2, a relatively harmless gas, and does nothing to control real air pollution like NOx, SOx, and particulates, or serious pollutants in water and soil.”
Note the extreme pollution of air, water and soil that still occurs in China and the Former Soviet Union.
3. “Kyoto wastes enormous resources that are urgently needed to solve real environmental and social problems that exist today. For example, the money spent on Kyoto in one year would provide clean drinking water and sanitation for all the people of the developing world in perpetuity.”
Since the start of global warming mania, about 50 million children below the age of five have died from contaminated water, and trillions of dollars have been squandered on global warming nonsense.
4. “Kyoto will destroy hundreds of thousands of jobs and damage the Canadian economy – the U.S., Canada’s biggest trading partner, will not ratify Kyoto, and developing countries are exempt.”
Canada signed Kyoto but then most provinces wisely ignored it – the exception being now-depressed Ontario, where government adopted ineffective “green energy” schemes, drove up energy costs, and drove out manufacturing jobs.
5. “Kyoto will actually hurt the global environment – it will cause energy-intensive industries to move to exempted developing countries that do not control even the worst forms of pollution.”
Note the huge manufacturing growth and extremely polluted air in industrial regions of China.
6. “Kyoto’s CO2 credit trading scheme punishes the most energy efficient countries and rewards the most wasteful. Due to the strange rules of Kyoto, Canada will pay the Former Soviet Union billions of dollars per year for CO2 credits.”
Our government did not pay the FSU, but other governments did, bribing them to sign Kyoto.
7. “Kyoto will be ineffective – even assuming the overstated pro-Kyoto science is correct, Kyoto will reduce projected warming insignificantly, and it would take as many as 40 such treaties to stop alleged global warming.”
If one believed the false climate models, one would conclude that we must cease using fossil fuels.
8. “The ultimate agenda of pro-Kyoto advocates is to eliminate fossil fuels, but this would result in a catastrophic shortfall in global energy supply – the wasteful, inefficient energy solutions proposed by Kyoto advocates simply cannot replace fossil fuels.”
Governments that adopted “green energy” schemes such as wind and solar power are finding these schemes are not green and produce little useful energy. Their energy costs are soaring and many of these governments are in retreat, dropping their green energy subsidies as fast as they politically can.
IN SUMMARY:
All the above predictions that we made in 2002 have proven correct in those states that fully adopted the Kyoto Accord, whereas none of the global warming alarmists’ scary warming projections have materialized.
Here is my recent paper, which is as controversial today as our aforementioned debate with the Pembina Institute was when it was published by the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Alberta in 2002.
I am confident that my recent paper is correct, with the possible exception of point 6 below – our prediction of imminent global cooling. I originally published our global cooling prediction in a Calgary Herald article in 2002, and I think it is still highly probable, given the current very low level of solar activity.
I hope to be wrong about global cooling, however, because cold weather kills many more people that warm weather, even in warm climates – also, I’m getting old and hate the cold.
Regards to all, Allan MacRae, P.Eng.
EVIDENCE SUGGESTING TEMPERATURE DRIVES ATMOSPHERIC CO2 MORE THAN CO2 DRIVES TEMPERATURE
September 4, 2015
By Allan MacRae
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/06/13/presentation-of-evidence-suggesting-temperature-drives-atmospheric-co2-more-than-co2-drives-temperature/
Observations and Conclusions:
1. Temperature, among other factors, drives atmospheric CO2 much more than CO2 drives temperature. The rate of change dCO2/dt is closely correlated with temperature and thus atmospheric CO2 LAGS temperature by ~9 months in the modern data record
2. CO2 also lags temperature by ~~800 years in the ice core record, on a longer time scale.
3. Atmospheric CO2 lags temperature at all measured time scales.
4. CO2 is the feedstock for carbon-based life on Earth, and Earth’s atmosphere and oceans are clearly CO2-deficient. CO2 abatement and sequestration schemes are nonsense.
5. Based on the evidence, Earth’s climate is insensitive to increased atmospheric CO2 – there is no global warming crisis.
6. Recent global warming was natural and irregularly cyclical – the next climate phase following the ~20 year pause will probably be global cooling, starting by ~2020 or sooner.
7. Adaptation is clearly the best approach to deal with the moderate global warming and cooling experienced in recent centuries.
8. Cool and cold weather kills many more people than warm or hot weather, even in warm climates. There are about 100,000 Excess Winter Deaths every year in the USA and about 10,000 in Canada.
9. Green energy schemes have needlessly driven up energy costs, reduced electrical grid reliability and contributed to increased winter mortality, which especially targets the elderly and the poor.
10. Cheap, abundant, reliable energy is the lifeblood of modern society. When politicians fool with energy systems, real people suffer and die. That is the tragic legacy of false global warming alarmism.
Allan MacRae, Calgary
~”Point: the oil industry, often viewed as the main culprit, understandably feel vulnerable in this regard.”
All I can say, Allan, is that I’m extremely envious of the Riches bestowed upon you by Big Oil. My check is not so much as even “in the Mail”!
“Point” referring to your excellent scientifically based Counter Points in:
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/KyotoAPEGA2002REV1.pdf
But sadly again, in 2004 I wrote a very Skeptical Letter to the Editor of our tiny populated but very large geographical County’s Newspaper, which they published a few months later as the only Letter for that edition, because it took up ~1 1/4 pages out of about 12 total pages in that edition. Alas, here in Redneck Cowboy Country I’ve received from Big Oil not even a can of Neatsfoot Oil!
JPeden,
For the record, I have never gained a penny for any of my writing or activities as a climate skeptic. We did get a small fee for one article in the Globe and Mail , but we gave it away.
It has probably cost me income. It would certainly be easier to go along with global warming alarmist falsehoods and get a job with a government agency or one of the warmist groups.
The subject has never been discussed with any of my clients.
Instead of fighting for what is right, most energy companies just try to go along and avoid controversy. This cowardice was a huge disservice to their shareholders and society.
I do this because it is a professional obligation to combat dangerous polices that cause significant harm to society.
Another recent example of safeguarding the public is described here:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/08/12/the-moral-case-for-fossil-fuels/comment-page-1/#comment-2277446
These are not risk-free activities. Tim Ball has received many threats. I have received only one, following an article in the National Post in 2002 – I feel somewhat slighted. 😉
Regards, Allan MacRae, P. Eng.
Yep, FabMax, you and Paul Krugman in a countrywide TV confrontation against safespace PCorrected armageddonist green belivers – still waiting for THAT arrogant breakthrough
[ difference is: I talked to every other layman in my country. I wrote to any MSM in my indigenous vulgar, (Dante Aligheri) and abroad to. Not that much response – but not for the bin.]
At this point it would not only be “surprising” for CO2-Climate Change to deliver just one correct Prediction based on “The Science” of increasing CO2 concentrations, it would also ruin its Perfect Record of Failure!
Unhinged pseudo-intellectual snobs aka “The Experts of Academia, Journalism, and The Totalitarian Utopia” would probably panic and have to move their Cult another 20,000 miles into the cold ether to try to escape the Reality dogging them ever since their “Unjust” emergence from the warm 98.6 deg. womb. And after all, who amongst them really wants to live or rule in North Korea, the Dead United Soviet Socialist Republic, Venezuela, or the Stone Age with the spectre of something like the heat of the Nuremberg Trials always at their cloven hoofs? Their only other option would be to repair to the Underworld from whence they ultimately came. But it was also certainly “too damn hot” for “The Boys” down there!
I wrote on this on FM’s facebook page and tried with my modest understanding to ask where the observed tropospheric hot spot was : you can read FM’s response : he asked for chapter and verse (IPCC or “reputable climate science”) where it said a hotpsot was connected, and when provided with what I thought was fair : ” IPCC, Assessment Report 4, (2007), working group 1, The Physical Science Basis, Chapter 8.Fig 8.14, page 631
Fabius Maximus There is nothing on p631 that supports your weird theory that the Hot Spot is the central theory in current climate science, or AGW.”
….obviously I’m not talking in a language FM can hear/understand