By Kip Hansen — 22 January 2020
On the 11th of November 2019, the NY Times published an article by journalist Lisa Friedman in the Climate Section titled: ”E.P.A. to Limit Science Used to Write Public Health Rules”.
[ Why does an article about the EPA and Health Rules appear in the Climate section of the NY Times? Who knows? ]
The article is a long series of accusations that the current administration’s EPA is trying to weaken the science used to make public policy. It includes the following:
“A new draft of the Environmental Protection Agency proposal, titled Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science, would require that scientists disclose all of their raw data, including confidential medical records, before the agency could consider an academic study’s conclusions. “
“The measure would make it more difficult to enact new clean air and water rules because many studies detailing the links between pollution and disease rely on personal health information gathered under confidentiality agreements. And, unlike a version of the proposal that surfaced in early 2018, this one could apply retroactively to public health regulations already in place.”
“The change is part of a broader administration effort to weaken the scientific underpinnings of policymaking.”
“The previous version of the regulation would have applied only to a certain type of research, “dose-response” studies in which levels of toxicity are studied in animals or humans. The new proposal would require access to the raw data for virtually every study that the E.P.A. considers. E.P.A. is proposing a broader applicability,” the new regulation states, saying that open data should not be limited to certain types of studies.” “Most significantly, the new proposal would apply retroactively. A separate internal E.P.A. memo viewed by The New York Times shows that the agency had considered, but ultimately rejected, an option that might have allowed foundational studies like Harvard’s Six Cities study to continue to be used.”
“The new version does not appear to have taken any of the opposition into consideration.”
Revealingly, the Times’ Lisa Friedman, writes “The Six Cities study and a 1995 American Cancer Society analysis of 1.2 million people that confirmed the Harvard findings appear to be the inspiration of the regulation.”
The E.P.A. issued a Press release the next day, 12 November 2019, titled “The New York Times’ Several Glaring Inaccuracies “That’s Fit To Print””, rebutting the Friedman story using the following language: (all segments are direct quotes and were bolded in the original press release)
“How the New York Times got it wrong:
…. This is completely false….
……which is completely false….
…. This is not true. ….
…. The story continues with more false information. ….
…. This is just wrong. ….
…. Science transparency does not weaken science, quite the contrary. ….
…. This is just bad reporting. It is completely misleading, and lacks the understanding of the rule making process. ….
…. This is completely false. ….
…. the reporter confuses the situation by using “raw data,” which is clarified in the supplemental. ….
…. This is not a new rule. ….”
How did the NY Times cover this press release? Did the NY Times print a correction to the Friedman article? No, it didn’t print a single word about it…not one mention … not even a little postscript added to the bottom of the original article. Despite the E.P.A.’s unusual official public statement intended to correct errors and mis-statements in the Friedman article, there has been no mention in the NY Times of the E.P.A. press release — not then, and not to date, two months later.
The Times did print a letter from a reader castigating the EPA, based on the (mis-)information in the Friedman article — but not the E.P.A.’s response. In the past, a loud cry would have gone up from the Times’ readership to its Public Editor, demanding that she look into the Friedman reporting and how the editors at the Climate Desk not only muffed the verification of facts in the original Friedman piece, but also questioning why the Climate Desk chief did not follow up with coverage of the damning E.P.A. response. Alas, at the NY Times, that oh-so-necessary position has been eliminated.
Is the New York Times the only detractor of the proposed E.P.A. “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” (STIRS) rule?
Not at all, in fact, the Times is just one single voice in a cacophonic outcry from the mass media, non-profit health organizations and even scientific journal editorial boards condemning the proposed rule. Using a Google internet search for the topic “EPA Secret Science Rule” throws over 3 million results…..almost entirely consisting of articles attacking the EPA’s proposed rule.
What is all this furor all about?
The E.P.A. explains the purpose of the proposed rule, in plain language, in a recent press release:
“EPA should ensure that the data and models underlying scientific studies that are pivotal to the regulatory action are available for review and reanalysis. The “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” rulemaking is designed to increase transparency in the preparation, identification and use of science in rulemaking. When final, this action will ensure that the regulatory science underlying EPA’s actions are made available in a manner sufficient for independent validation.“ …. “…the science transparency rule will ensure that all important studies underlying significant regulatory actions at the EPA, regardless of their source, are subject to a transparent review by qualified scientists.”
Exactly how a rule that fulfills those stated purposes could be perceived as a “threat to science” and an attempt to “suppress science” seems a mystery. Hasn’t it always been true that scientific research should be transparent, that the results, especially those used to formulate public policy and governmental regulations, should be able to be validated by other groups of scientists? — scientists not involved or vested in the original research? Isn’t this process what we know as “replication of scientific results”? The United Kingdom’s Royal Society, originally known as ‘The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge”, has to this day the motto ‘Nullius in verba’ which “is taken to mean ‘take nobody’s word for it’. It is an expression of the determination of Fellows to withstand the domination of authority and to verify all statements by an appeal to facts determined by experiment.” Not just accepting any and all experimental results claimed by a single source, but results and findings replicated and checked and repeatedly, verified by independent researchers.
As in many areas of governmental regulation and rulemaking, and in the writing of laws, the devil is nearly always in the details. The hundreds of media articles and journal papers contain complaints less often about the overall purpose of the proposed rule, though there is some of that, but mostly focus on real and, more often, imagined possible problems.
What are the problems that the detractors raise?
- The “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” (STIRS) rule might “increase the risk that confidential health data could be linked back to patients.” [ source ]
- Detractors fears that STIRS “would be used as a mechanism for suppressing the use of relevant scientific evidence in policy-making, including public health regulations.” [ source ]
- Many fear that “foundational science from years past—research on air quality and asthma, for example, or water quality and human health—could be deemed by the EPA to be insufficient for informing our most significant public health issues. That would be a catastrophe.” [ source ]
- “… they fear agency officials will use it to rule out epidemiological studies that include confidential patient data that are difficult to make public. Such studies have often underpinned tougher air and water pollution regulations.” [ source ]
- “Restricting the application of established science when crafting new E.P.A. rules could make it easier to weaken or repeal existing health regulations…” [ source ]
- “Opponents of the proposed E.P.A. policy say the effort all comes back to the fossil fuel industry’s decades-long frustration over the Six Cities study and a related one sponsored by the American Cancer Society.” [ source ]
This six-item list summarizes hundreds of articles, essays, opinion columns and mass media pieces attacking the STIRS rule. Common to almost all of them is expressed concern about one specific item: EPA air pollution studies — two of them actually: the Harvard Six Cities study [ doi: 10.1056/NEJM199312093292401 ] and various studies based on the American Cancer Society’s Cancer Prevention Study II [ doi: 10.1289/EHP1249 ].
What are these studies?
These are the primary studies that underpin almost all of today’s air pollution regulations in the United States. Lisa Friedman of the NY Times, among many others, claims that:
“Those studies, which have been independently evaluated and have had their findings confirmed, underpinned the first Clean Air Act regulations on fine particulate matter. Based on the research, the E.P.A. in 1997 estimated the rule would prevent 15,000 premature deaths annually and hundreds of thousands of cases of asthma and bronchitis.”
If these two studies and their findings have already been independently evaluated and have had their findings confirmed, why is there any concern among the EPA-STIRS rule detractors and protesters that somehow new evaluations and re-analyses will fail to do the same?
[ For the answer to that question, continue reading in Secret Science Under Attack — Part 2 — coming tomorrow. ]
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Author’s Comment:
This s a hot topic — with loads of media coverage, almost all from a single viewpoint. As is normal in today’s highly politicized world, the facts are generally far different than what the media presents.
This piece is a straight essay, presenting the ongoing story of the opposition to the E.P.A.’s proposed “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” (STIRS) rule.
Tomorrow, I will post an Opinion piece on what I think about why that opposition exists.
Featured Image Credit: h/t to http://www.users.totalise.co.uk/~darkhorse459/secret.html — once associated with the University of Brighton and which seems to be defunct in the present.
As usual, please address your comments to “Kip…” if speaking to me.
# # # # #
Leftists don’t like science they can’t manipulate.
Mann-ipulated
Karl-ized
Fully Cook-ed
Secret Science is what got us to the pretty pass at present with the Global Warming-Climate Change boondoggle. Secret Science enabled such propaganda elements like the ‘Hockey Stick’ and the ‘97% of scientist believe’ to emerge from under their rocks.
There is a crisis in modern science: “The Irreproducibility Crisis of Modern Science: Causes, Consequences, and the Road to Reform”
https://www.nas.org/reports/the-irreproducibility-crisis-of-modern-science
John Ioannidis is a physician-scientist and writer who has shown that much of the published research does not meet good scientific standards of evidence. His 2005 paper “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False” was the initial that brought this crisis to light.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ioannidis
The EPA rule is just one of many we need to clean up this mess
Good comment Walter.
I wrote this post 8 years ago and it is still true today.
Let’s immodestly call it “MacRae’s version of the Null Hypothesis”. 🙂
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/16/quote-of-the-week-andrew-bolt-nails-fakegate/#comment-770951
[excerpt]
You can save yourselves a lot of time, and generally be correct, by simply assuming that EVERY SCARY PREDICTION the global warming alarmists express is FALSE.
The warming alarmists have a near-perfect negative predictive track record – every one of their scary predictions has failed to materialize.
It is entirely correct that President Trump has called out the doomsters for their failed predictions of disaster. Every one of the global warming/climate change extremists’ very-scary predictions has FAILED TO HAPPEN! Nobody should believe them.
______________________________
“This is not a time for pessimism, this is a time for optimism. Fear and doubt is not a good thought process because this is a time for tremendous hope, and joy and optimism and action.
BUT TO EMBRACE THE POSSIBILITIES OF TOMORROW, WE MUST REJECT THE PERENNIAL PROPHETS OF DOOM AND THEIR PREDICTIONS OF THE APOCALYPSE.
THEY ARE THE HEIRS OF YESTERDAY’S FOOLISH FORTUNE TELLERS, AND I HAVE THEM, AND YOU HAVE THEM AND WE ALL HAVE THEM AND THEY WANT TO SEE US DO BADLY BUT WE WON’T LET THAT HAPPEN. THEY PREDICTED AN OVERPOPULATION CRISIS IN THE 1960S, MASS STARVATION IN THE 70S, AND AN END OF OIL IN THE 1990S.
THESE ALARMISTS ALWAYS DEMAND THE SAME THING: ABSOLUTE POWER TO DOMINATE, TRANSFORM AND CONTROL EVERY ASPECT OF OUR LIVES.”
– Donald Trump in Davos Switzerland, January 2020
At least as far as climate is concerned, President Trump was probably the only sane person at Davos.
We owe a great debt to him.
I passionately hope that he will do even more in his second term.
Yes, there is a climate emergency. But it’s not caused by the climate, which has been changing for countless thousands of years. The modern global warming is not a problem, it’s a huge benefit. If it had not been for that warming we would still be in the depths of the Little Ice Age. That really would be a catastrophe.
For the believers, the real climate emergency is that the world – or at least, most of it – is refusing to give up its future prosperity for green fantasy.
It’s also obvious why the believers hate these new EPA rules. The last thing they want is science that is transparent and science that can be replicated!
Chris
Chris
“It’s also obvious why the believers hate these new EPA rules.”
Thieves, corrupt scientists and others of their ilk are like cockroaches and vampires. They abhor the light.
Ya gotta love, Trump! He would fit right in here on the comment board at WUWT. 🙂
I’m not sure if this is a new propaganda technique or just something that happens. I noticed the same thing when I was looking for something by Jordan Peterson. I had trouble finding what I was looking for because it was buried under a zillion ill informed and outright stupid attempted rebuttals of Peterson’s work.
At least this time when I googled epa secret science rebuttal, the EPA’s rebuttal appeared on the first page of the search results. link
Shhh, once google learns that is the case, they’ll “adjust” their algorithms to push it back to page 20+
Solution: Stop using Google.
Thank you Bob for your post on another thread:
Transcript of President Donald Trump’s speech at the World Economic Forum,
Davos, Switzerland, 21 January 2020
Part 1: https://thebfd.co.nz/2020/01/transcript-trumps-davos-speech-part-one/
Part 2: https://thebfd.co.nz/2020/01/transcript-trumps-davos-speech-part-two/
Part 3: https://thebfd.co.nz/2020/01/transcript-trumps-davos-speech-part-three/
Part 4: https://thebfd.co.nz/2020/01/transcript-trumps-davos-speech-part-four/
Excerpt:
“Fear and doubt is not a good thought process because this is a time for tremendous hope and joy and optimism and action. But to embrace the possibilities of tomorrow, we must reject the perennial prophets of doom and their predictions of the apocalypse. They are the heirs of yesterday’s foolish fortune-tellers — and I have them and you have them, and we all have them, and they want to see us do badly, but we don’t let that happen.
They predicted an overpopulation crisis in the 1960s, mass starvation in the ’70s, and an end of oil in the 1990s. These alarmists always demand the same thing: absolute power to dominate, transform, and control every aspect of our lives. We will never let radical socialists destroy our economy, wreck our country, or eradicate our liberty.”
I believe this quote will define the Trump Presidency, in much the same way that Franklin Roosevelt trumpeted “A day of infamy” and Winston Churchill extolled “Our finest hour”.
Because we are at war, as surely as Britain was in 1939 and the USA was in 1941. And this war is for our democracies and our freedoms. It is abundantly clear that the global warming/climate change scam was never about the climate – it was always a smokescreen, a false front for a radical socialist takeover of our democracies – the end of freedom.
John Ioannidis shook up the medical research world with:
Ioannidis, J.P., 2005. Why most published research findings are false. PLos med, 2(8), p.e124.
That resulted in:
Moher, D., Liberati, A., Tetzlaff, J. and Altman, D.G., 2009. Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: the PRISMA statement. Annals of internal medicine, 151(4), pp.264-269.
https://annals.org/acp/content_public/journal/aim/20188/0000605-200908180-00008.pdf
He continues:
Ioannidis, J.P., 2016. Why most clinical research is not useful. PLoS medicine, 13(6), p.e1002049.
So Ioannidis provides very strong reasons to examine the statistics behind such claims, especially when the studies demand they be kept “secret”.
“Confidential patient records” are not found in studies except maybe in anecdotal data and case reports. I hope such “studies” are not the basis for regulatory schemes.
Dr. Dall ==> Yes, the “patient confidentiality” objection is an obvious Straw Man — researchers have already had the data, the reported re-analyses have already reportedly been done. the US has very strong HIPA laws…sometimes I can’t evcen get my own medical information.
Anonymizing data so that it can no longer be traced back to an individual has been standard practice for decades. I work with medical data. We have multiple data bases, some of them have actual patient data, and they are tightly controlled. We have other data bases where the data has been anonymized and is freely available.
Hanson:
Is it still true that you criticize the New York Times while simultaneously rewarding them with your money, used to purchase a subscription?
If that is still true, it is evidence that you have a problem.
Also, any organization that declares the staff of life on this planet, carbon dioxide, is a pollutant, is NOT a scientific organization.
Richard ==> If one only exposes oneself to ideas with which one agrees, one has blindered themselves and will suffer from echo-chamber effect.
It is necessary for true understanding of any subject to read widely, to read both sides of every issue.
No one mistakes the NY Times for a scientific organization, but we can try to hold them to the standard of journalism, which the Times has abandoned for the most part.
Richard ==> If one only exposes oneself to ideas with which one agrees, one has blindered themselves and will suffer from echo-chamber effect.
“blindered” ?
Did you mean “Venetian blindered” ?
What a pile of political platitudes, and steaming farm animal digestive waste products, that you have responded with, Hanson !
This has nothing to do with “ideas”.
Climate science is about theories that are supported by data, and logic.
You don’t “agree” or “disagree” with a theory — in fact, you have to assume it will eventually be proven wrong — anywhere from slightly wrong, to completely wrong.
Such is the history of science.
You try to determine how well the data / math support the theory, whether the theory has predictive value, whether the experiment has been replicated, and whether the data and/or conclusions have SURVIVED a thorough “attack” by skeptics (real peer review — not pal review).
The New York Times strongly favors wild guess, always wrong, “consensus” predictions of a coming climate catastrophe.
Could you imagine the Times printing an article saying that the current climate is wonderful, even though it is, compared with the past 1,000 years !
They are not interested in climate reality, just climate fantasy.
The Times is a good source of junk science, and wild guess predictions — no one is going to become more knowledgeable about climate science from reading it.
However, it is a very good bird cage liner.
I have to conclude that you subscribe to the New York Times either because you have more money than you know what to do with … or so you can get material to write nasty articles about the newspaper, which you do well.
Richard G- “blindered” as in horses fitted with blinders to keep them from reacting suddenly to non-problems. They are often used at races, or were uses all the time back when horses were used in cities.
“What a pile of political platitudes, and steaming farm animal digestive waste products, that you have responded with, Hanson !”
His name is Hansen. It’s spelled multiple times right in front of you, yet you still can’t get it right, multiple times.
R Greene, you say: “They are not interested in climate reality, just climate fantasy.
The Times is a good source of junk science, and wild guess predictions — no one is going to become more knowledgeable about climate science from reading it.”
Which is why its falsehoods need to be exposed and you should be congratulating Mr Hansen (note the spelling Mr Greene) for doing so and not casigating him.
PS: How do you know it is only fit for lining bird cages if you don’t read it?
Not to mention, anonymizing patient data is a very common thing these days.
Jeff ==> Any very easy to strip out of a data base or spreadsheet — any competent database manager could do it as a day’s work.
And required by the ethical practices of human subject research. I have to take a 10-hour course to get recertified every two years just to analyze survey results from college students.
speaking of science transparency….what ever happened with this?
by law NASA had until last Nov …and they had to reply to it
CEI Files Formal Complaint Regarding NASA’s Claim of 97% Climate Scientist Agreement on Global Warming
The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) petitioned NASA to remove from its website the claim that 97 percent of climate scientists agree humans are responsible for global warming. The petition, filed under the Information Quality Act (IQA), points out the major flaws in the studies cited by NASA to substantiate its claim. It requests the agency remove the claim from its website and stop circulating it in agency materials.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/07/13/cei-files-formal-complaint-regarding-nasas-claim-of-97-climate-scientist-agreement-on-global-warming/
I’m curious too. Can’t find anything on CEI’s site about it except the same link you posted.
Maybe someone from CEI could weigh in on that for us here.
This is a very important issue. NASA is wrong and NASA should acknowledge it is wrong, and NASA has an obligation to address this issue. NASA’s “97% Lie” is misleading the public and scaring school children.
re. patient confidentiality
There is about zero chance of linking study information back to individual patients. These days, it is darn hard in some fields to do research because ethics reviews are necessary. link The rules are daunting. The linked page is a guideline for deciding whether an ethics review is necessary. If the review is necessary, things get real Byzantine real fast.
When I was a pup, we derided fields like Psychology as being pretty Mickey Mouse. Things have changed. Those folks have to jump through hoops that I couldn’t have imagined in my worst nightmares.
Actually most research shows that it is fairly easy to recover personal information from
anonymised data. See
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jul/23/anonymised-data-never-be-anonymous-enough-study-finds
for example.
Nonsense
Hi Jeff,
Do you have any actual evidence to rebut peer reviewed research:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-10933-3
I am not expert but there have been lots of examples of researchers
identifying individuals from supposedly anonymised data. There is even
a wikipedia page on data re-identification. You are much better off
assuming that clever people can identify you in a data set than assuming the
opposite.
Skimming through that paper, it doesn’t look like the data they worked with was anonymized very well. Having a date of birth, and location, yeah you could probably find someone (their probability was 58% with sex, race, date of birth, and location).
I’m also not impressed with scientists who don’t know the difference between gender and sex.
Jeff,
the point is that most data is not well anonymised. And usually there is a trade off
between how well anonymised it is and how useful it is.
“I am not expert but there have been lots of examples of researchers
identifying individuals from supposedly anonymised data.”
Why would they want to do that? What would they gain even if they could identify an individual?
Instead of arguing against transparency, why not argue for better security within the transparency? Scientific studies that cannot be replicated are worthless, plain and simple.
Izaak ==> You are talking apples-and-oranges. No study contains individuals entire medical records — certainty not the ones in question here. No one should be including patients entire medical records in any study as raw data. To do so violates HIPA in spades. Only the data needed for a specific study should be in the study data — and that is easily anonymized.
If it contains the actual date of birth, then it hasn’t been randomized very well. Everything I’ve worked with slots individuals based on the decade in which they were born.
The only portion of the address remaining is sometimes the zip code, sometimes the city and state.
“the point is that most data is not well anonymised. And usually there is a trade off
between how well anonymised it is and how useful it is.”
You’ve nullified your point, since you assumed the data was well anonymized. It wasn’t.
Another case from the guardian article, addresses of taxi drivers: Apparently the route data included the start and endpoints for the day. If they’re the same, then you know where the taxi was garaged (could a home, could be the taxi barn). So, that data should have been excluded as obviously identifiable. But, all you’d really need to do is drive around and see where taxis are parked in a driveway or something, and you have your answer. So I don’t see how that’s very sensitive info.
Izaak ==> The examples in the Guardian article show that the personal data was not properly removed or handled.
” Science Under Attack ”
Yes sir.
That’s what the Union of Concerned Scientists are Concerned about.
That and your donations of course.
https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/01/20/8265/
chaamjamal ==> Thanks for the link — nice piece.
thank you, sir.
Thank you, Kip. Looking forward to part2 tomorrow.
Regards,
Bob
Bob ==> Part 2 is an opinion piece….it should post sometime tomorrow. Thanks for your support.
This has always bothered me.
The fact that the Six City Study data has not been made available for independent review and analysis is one of the bigger all-time coverups in the environmental world. See Steve Miloy “Scare Pollution Why and How to Fix the EPA” for his take on the claim that they been “independently evaluated and had their findings confirmed”.
Roger ==> Yes, I reviewed Milloy’s take in my research. He has some strong opinions.
Kip ==> Well put
I wonder what would happen if a motion were put to all sovereign nations requiring them to enshrine in law that no regulations would be introduced that had not been transparently subjected to the full process of the classic scientific method, and independently certified as such.
For example, who would then rely on any of Kevin Tremberth’s research, after he insisted that the null hypothesis could be discarded when it comes to the AGW hypothesis?
Mr. ==> The null hypothesis can never be ignored — as there are no rate ratios or other statistical comparisons without a null.
The Harvard Six Cities study has 33% to 40% smokers. Nowadays only 15% Americans smoke. This key factor would surely make this study now redundant .
waza ==> The study purports to find air pollution guilty of increased mortality.
Kip, I don’t know if you’ve seen these, but Stanley Young and his collaborators have published a couple of papers showing that PM 2.5 has had zero impact on mortality in California.
Stan told me about his work when I met him at the 2015 DDP conference. I looked out for the published papers.
Here are the titles and links. If you’d like the papers themselves, let me know. CtM has my email address.
“Air quality and acute deaths in California, 2000-2012”
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.yrtph.2017.06.003
“PM2.5 and ozone, indicators of air quality, and acute deaths in California, 2004–2007
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.yrtph.2018.05.012
Here’s the abstract of the 2018 paper (my bold):
“Since the London Great Smog of 1952 was estimated to have killed over 4000 people, scientists have studied the relationship between air quality and acute mortality. Currently, the association between air quality and acute deaths is usually taken as evidence for causality. As air quality has markedly improved since 1952, do contemporary data sets support this view? We use a large data set, eight air basins in California for the years 2004–2007, to examine the possible association of ozone and PM2.5 with acute deaths after statistically removing seasonal and weather effects. Our analysis data set is available on request. We conducted a regression-corrected, case-crossover analysis for all non-accidental deaths age 75 and older. We used stepwise regression to examine three causes of death. After seasonal and weather adjustments, there was essentially no predictive power of ozone or PM2.5 for acute deaths. The case-crossover analysis produced odds ratio very close to 1.000 (no effect). The very narrow confidence limits indicated good statistical power. We study recent air quality in both time stratified, symmetric, bidirectional case-crossover and time series regression and both give consistent results. There is no statistically significant association between either ozone or PM2.5 and acute human mortality. In the absence of an association, causality is in question.”
If there was ever a confirmation of your support for transparency of data on which policy is based, Kip, the Young, et al., results represent it.
Pat ==> Thanks for the links — Young’s papers were among the 150 studies and articles used as background for this little two-part series….Readers interested in the PM2.5 topic should read to the two links.
Kip
“… original known as ‘The Royal Society …”
The NYT ‘climate change’ reporter’s apparent concern over the confidentiality of subjects in epidemiological studies is just a shallow pretext for a much wider worry in the CC industry that is obvious from its history as in: “We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you, when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it”:
https://climateaudit.org/2005/03/05/top-eleven-reasons-for-withholding-data-or-code/
Chris ==> Yes, By inference, we suspect that CliSci has the same problem of iffy results that depend on statistical mthods to find any result at all.
Does anyone know why the are hiding the results.
Is it a maths problem?
Is it a cooked the book problem?
Or is it a ok study but not conclusive but we’ll run with it anyway?
WAZA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8j3a4MBUU40
Is an explanation of the problems with the CPSII study. I think the answers to your questions are yes, yes, and irrelevant based on 1&2.
Waza ==> See Part 2 — should be up now.
Dear Waza,
The Harvard Six Cities study alleged to have found a “causal link” between fine particulates (<2.5 microns) and "excess mortality". From the abstract:
Although the effects of other, unmeasured risk factors cannot be excluded with certainty, these results suggest that fine-particulate air pollution, or a more complex pollution mixture associated with fine particulate matter, contributes to excess mortality in certain U.S. cities.
The EPA has used the study to promulgate a vast body of regulations of so-called PM2.5 air pollution. These regulations impact nearly every business, industry, city, and county in the USA.
The PM2.5 findings, however, have been thoroughly debunked. See:
https://junkscience.com/2016/09/fact-sheet-particulate-matter-in-outdoor-air-does-not-cause-death/
I’m pretty sure that Mr. Hansen will elucidate all this in Part 2.
Hi Mike Dubrasich, – Statements about “excess mortality” is an unfortunate phrasing. I find the contemporary published PM 2.5 research is more specific in phrasing the issue as “premature mortality”. Look at it the same way unsanitary water affect humans – that can shave 0.57 years of the lifespan.
In other words the relevance to “mortality” is in regards to impact on average life expectancy not to high PM 2.5 actively killing people. A recent estimate for global average is 1.03 years premature mortality (with Bangladesh higher at 1.87 years); for the USA an estimate is of an average 0.38 years premature mortality.
Mike and DMA
Thanks for the info – very interesting. But what is actually wrong?
I get that the correlation is very small 1.02 but I still don’t get what’s wrong. Need data!!
My guess now seems more like a tree health only being related to temperature type issue.
Another guess is that smoking drowns out all other causes in the study.
I am an engineer not a scientist so I don’t get all the official jargon but I am confident a 2% likelihood without actual medical studies is meaningless.
On a personal note my father was a welder/boiler maker who applied asbestos lagging to steam pipes. He also drove trucks And was a heavy smoker. He died very young from throat cancer.
It was not possible then and imo not even now that any medical study can determine % breakdown of the cause of my father,s death or anyone else with multiple health issues.
Simple things the study will not pick up ( maybe -we don’t have data) participants from lower social economic groups more likely to smoke, work outdoors, live near industrial areas, take care of their health less , than higher social economic participants. Did they ask income in study.
Mike ==> Yes, I try to — Part 2 is up now.
The Harvard Six Cities?? That is well known to be deeply flawed and the basis of numerous suspect regulations and pontifications.
“The measure would make it more difficult to enact new clean air and water rules because many studies detailing the links between pollution and disease rely on personal health information gathered under confidentiality agreements…”
Confidentiality agreements with whom? The holders of the info or people involved? Be specific because I smell a con.
Most links between pollution levels and health are estimated, not based on studies of people. The GBD exercise makes attributions, not evaluations of illness and death based on what individuals died from. There is a huge difference between public health policy and medicine.
Links between pollution and specific diseases are frequently attributed, not the result of “links” from studies. Obviously there are such studies, but don’t get the impression that most “links” are from medical studies. They are from allocations of multiple causes to population cohorts.
For example, the equitoxicity ruling by the EPA (that all particulate matter is equally toxic no matter the source or content) is paired with “exposure”. People’s exposure is attributed based on geography, not actual exposure. And there is no duration factor in that exposure, just the fact of it regardless of duration. It is silly, actually, that public health regulations are based on so much guesswork and “expert assessment”. Medical studies as we all know, are more than 50% irreproducible, right. What was the exact number?
The situation is much worse than many would be willing to believe. Hokum is peddled up and down the country. So is snake oil in various forms. Some things never change.
When Harvard’s six cities is exposed for the shoddy work it contains, many dominoes will fall – watch for it. It has been a good run for a generation of estimators but the sham has to end at some point. The connections between “pollution” and health are incredibly complex and largely unknown. There simply isn’t enough data to make most of the estimated judgments. Fine, what to do in the meantime? We do the best we can by estimating. But estimates are not facts. PM is not all equally toxic. Coal plant emissions do not “kill thousands each year”. Chronic under-heating literally kills tens of thousands each year because energy is expensive. That is a medical diagnosis, not an attribution. That’s real and continues even this very day.
Waza asks, “Or is it a ok study but not conclusive but we’ll run with it anyway?”
Yup, that is exactly how it works. We will err on the side not of caution, but of income. At each decision tree, take the branch marked “More”.
Off topic however, Price Charles is at it again;
https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/prince-charles-pleads-for-sweeping-new-economic-model-to-avert-climate-catastrophe-20200123-p53tw9.html
My! It’s only 11 years of so that he said we had only 100 months to save the planet.
One impact of the EPA PM2.5 regs is that almost every attempt to do prescribed burning on Fed lands (USFS, BLM, NPS) is hamstrung by NEPA lawsuits brought by enviro-litigious groups based on PM2.5 from smoke.
The resulting dearth of prescribed burning has led to catastrophic fuel accumulations and mega-fires (>100,000 acres) that destroy entire watersheds, landscapes, and adjacent towns, and kill numerous people.
In response to the endless lawsuits, Fed landowning agencies have adopted Let-It-Burn policies whereby they no longer fight lightning fires, in the hopes that burning without preparing the forest to receive fires will accomplish the same goal of fuel reduction as prescribed fires.
Let-It Burn fires do NOT achieve those goals but instead actualize the hazard and lead to even more mega-fires.
Thus our forest fire crisis can be attributed directly to the PM2.5 regulations. Howzat for crappy gummit? The Deep State blames “climate change” for a problem of their own making. There are consequences to agenda-driven junk science that more folks ought to be aware of.
Mike ==> Interesting point.
The New York Times is propaganda. If you read everything they publish through that lens, it all makes sense.
If they won’t let anyone check their work, it isn’t science. Reproduction of results is an extremely important part of the process. Without reproduction, all they are doing is hand waving.
Or, to paraphrase American Senator T. Cruz’s take on law: If you have the facts, you bang the facts. If you have the data, you bang the data. If you don’t have either, you bang the table!
I think that saying is a lot older than Ted Cruz.
STIRS rule = STIRS control
rule
/ruːl/
Learn to pronounce
noun
1.
one of a set of explicit or understood regulations or principles governing conduct or procedure within a particular area of activity.
“the rules of cricket”
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direction
ukase
pronunciamento
2.
control of or dominion over an area or people.
“the revolution brought an end to British rule”
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jurisdiction
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government
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verb
1.
exercise ultimate power or authority over (an area and its people).
“Latin America today is ruled by elected politicians”
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preside over
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be the leader of
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head
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sit on the throne
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wield the sceptre
be monarch
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2.
pronounce authoritatively and legally to be the case.
“an industrial tribunal ruled that he was unfairly dismissed from his job”
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I wonder how many people will loose their jobs when your boss or future boss can view your medical records.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7908761/Hospitals-granted-Microsoft-Amazon-IBM-access-medical-records.html
re the corps granted access
yup
thats why most Gps and public in Aus wont sign onto the e health crap
and yes its already been hacked twice I think
for paltry1.5bil setup I think I read..
not sure if KRudd or juLiar were the ones that set that in motion?
jmrpuss ==> No one is suggesting (or allowing under EPA STIRS) the release of personal medical records to corporations.
Those sharticle’s authors are shamelessly supporting such indecent behavior :
– from a Great Climate Pseudo-scientist : “Why should I make the data available to you when your aim is to try and find something wrong ?”
This reminds me of the arguments about fat and carbohydrates in diets.
As far as I remember the original report on fats excluded some of the results that didn’t fit the narrative.
Would the NYT argue that we shouldn’t revisit the original research because of problems with confidentiality?
StephenP ==> There is a lot of science at EPA and FDA that is iffy — not up to scientific standards that has been shoved down the throats of the rest of the world. the STIRS rule is a good start to sort this all out.
The FDA has one of the most arrogant statements on the planet. They require this to be placed on a myriad of items. The FDA is not the end all be all in of human health. Nor does the FDA per the suggestion of that statement, conduct any studies. They contract those out to the CDC, NIH, or other 3rd parties.
Their most important function is the monitoring and enforcement of the manufacturing process protocols of pharmaceuticals, GMP. Still they are largely a parasitical bureaucratic organization. Although it does occur to me that all the other government agencies conducting scientific studies for the people should be required to also follow GMP.
This reminds me of the arguments about fat and carbohydrates in diets.
As far as I remember the original report on fats excluded some of the results that didn’t fit the narrative.
Would the NYT argue that we shouldn’t revisit the original research because of problems with confidentiality or that the science was settled?
Because, my children, Ignorance is Strengh.
Bill ==> A lot of “science” associations are saying — “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.”
I did not know that anyone with a working brain cell really reads the NYT any more. Isn’t that so-called newspaper slipping into oblivion, or something? Obviously, you have to read drivel at its source to understand the real issue, which is that the media in general have let the cheese slide off their crackers and are sinking into a pit of their own making.
It’s a pity they have to end up that way, but sometimes, you have to break something down in order to fix it. Strange that I am seeing this in my lifetime.
Sara ==> The New York Times is considered one of the world’s pre-eminent “Newspapers of Record”. That means that what they print is accepted as revealed truth by other newspapers and goes into libraries all around the world as factual.
That it isn’t factual is a real problem. That they don’t publish corrections is a real problem. That news pages are filled with stories that are in reality opinion pieces is a real problem.
I try, in some small way, to push back.
Kip, you must have the patience of a saint to push back. I salute you! But I doubt that they’ll change until or unless their daydreams are despoiled by a harsh reality check.
Sara ==> I don’t hope to change them — the Times — but we are making inroads on the public consciousness on specific issues, such as climate change.
Public trust, in general, is declining for these liberal-progressive news outlets that have abandoned journalism.
secretum scientia neglegenda (Disregard secret science) 🙂
From the article: “EPA should ensure that the data and models underlying scientific studies that are pivotal to the regulatory action are available for review and reanalysis. The “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science” rulemaking is designed to increase transparency in the preparation, identification and use of science in rulemaking. When final, this action will ensure that the regulatory science underlying EPA’s actions are made available in a manner sufficient for independent validation.“ …. “…the science transparency rule will ensure that all important studies underlying significant regulatory actions at the EPA, regardless of their source, are subject to a transparent review by qualified scientists.”
NASA Climate and NOAA should have similar rules established for their climate data. It is scandulous that this information is not available considering that TRILLIONS of dollars of spending are being planned based on the climate studies done by NASA Climate and NOAA.
This is data paid for by American taxpayers, and government scientists have no right to withhold this information from the American public. In fact, they have a duty to science and to the public to “show their work”.
Tom ==> Fully agree — we may need a layered approach to access to deal with some of the details, but access should be a minimum requirement.
If Andrew Wakefield’s data had not been obtainable, the FDA could be banning vaccines using the EPA’s methodology.
That’s rather scary.
Does the 6-city study look at people by neighborhood, or merely by city?
Even in polluted cities, actual pollution levels can vary quite a bit from one place to another.
MarkW ==> Doesn’t really matter — the study mostly found null effects and those few that are found are very small — to the point of being inconsequential.
Having one more reason to pile on never hurts.
MarkW => Well, that’;s true! Have at it!
This proposal makes the use of propaganda to underpin rules and regulations much more difficult, and therefore MUST be rejected. How else are we to force economic control down people’s throats when so many actually have enough intelligence to ask for scientific evidence and data backing a new regulation?
We (the liberals) just do not have time for this nonsense, we have people’s lives to run, social justice to enforce, and wealth distribution to manage.
(Yes, this is sarcasm…at least I hope it is)
If the EPA’s new “transparency in science” requirement that all data be reviewable makes it harder for Mann, Trenberth, et al. to “hide the decline”, I’m all for it.
Mark Twain once wrote that there are “lies, damned lies, and statistics”. We should add to his list “scientific studies not independently reviewed”.
Somehow the New York Slimes gets away with portraying the Trump Administration as anti-scientific. But allowing people to review data and question hypotheses and conclusions is how true science advances. If a scientist’s theory doesn’t match reality, the theory needs to be changed.
I was not surprised to see a reference to the American Cancer Society CPS-II dataset. It is only accessible to the Society and its “approved” collaborators, who have used it extensively for many years to drive federal government actions. For example, it’s the origin of the CDC’s estimate of 480,000 smoking-attributable deaths each year, which has justified almost unlimited punitive policies aimed at the people who use tobacco and at the companies who provide it. As a university-based tobacco researcher for 25 years, I tried to get access, but was denied: https://rodutobaccotruth.blogspot.com/2011/04/american-cancer-society-withholds.html
It’s time to start giving teeth to NIH data sharing and accessibility in all fields: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2019/11/08/2019-24529/request-for-public-comments-on-a-draft-nih-policy-for-data-management-and-sharing-and-supplemental
Brad Rodu
Professor
Professor Rodu ==> Thanks for weighing in with your professional perspective. It is precisely such unscientific behavior that provoked the EPA proposed rule.
This Fake news is unbelievable.
The entire NYT article has a series of lies concerning the EPA change ….
….
William: The NYT Reporter is not a ‘reporter’… who does not know how to do their job.
This is the new normal for the Fake News.
The NYT fake Reporter appears to be absolutely ignorant concerning the actual EPA change, its expected effect, the scientific community’s support of the change, and so on,
Fake news reporters do not do real investigative reporting (where bad ideas and bad policies are found and criticized by patriotic young reporters) because knowing the truth….
…would make it harder to find the over the top adjectives and lies that are required to create the propaganda that pushes a political agenda.
The NYT article was 100% made up and incorrect… to push the propaganda idea that data and methods sharing is anti science.
From the EPA’s response to NYT Propaganda Piece…
“The article continues with more misleading and false information.
The reporter writes: “The change is part of a broader administration effort to weaken the scientific underpinnings of policymaking.”
Science transparency does not weaken science, quite the contrary. By requiring transparency, scientists will be required to publish hypothesis and experimental data for other scientists to review and discuss, requiring the science to withstand skepticism and peer review.”
NY Times published an article by journalist Lisa Friedman in the Climate Section titled: ”E.P.A. to Limit Science Used to Write Public Health Rules”.
____________________________________
[ Why does an article about the EPA and Health Rules appear in the Climate section of the NY Times? Who knows? ]
____________________________________
And why writes NY Times journalist Lisa Friedman EPA separated by dots as E.P.A. .
Is this the new internal NYT redaction rule.
– sure insiders only –