He's clearly very angry, I don't exactly blame him either.
The problem with the "climate change debate" is that it is a) political and b) full of bad science. The actual problem, of course, is that the bad science and the political happen, in this case, to agree.
To those decrying his strong assertions of fraud, I agree there is a little too much hyperbole in his resignation. However I think he is absolutely right that the money is skewing the science, as much as the politics.
What the scientists don't seem to understand is that a politician probably doesn't really care what happens in the future (so long as it does not happen in his/her lifetime) they are more interested in the political advantage it is offering. This is the same for pretty much any wide-scale "popular" crisis that occurs (e.g. the bird flu "pandemic").
And, so, we are in this weird situation where a very serious issue is facing us (well, facing us in a few generations) but most of the work seems to relate to arguing, using it to political advantage and scaring the public.
Rather than actually doing anything very much.
And the public have absolutely no idea what to believe, expect or do (except for some vague notion that maybe they should invest in a solar panel). The media have been handed the words "a scientific consensus" which confuses people even more, and means absolutely nothing. The media and the politicos have spun the whole thing into a mess of fear in the populace; who has this sense that there is a major urgency and we should be panicking. When clearly, that is a silly response.
The truth, sadly, is that nothing is at all clear at this point, apart from the fact we are seeing some form of, probably quite significant, climate change some portion of which is out fault. And only a developing sense of what to do about it and what it will lead to (environment wise). Anyone who claims to be able to predict the outcome, from this point on, with any degree of certainty I am quite happy to call a fraud. Ditto for anyone that claims conclusively to have shown the extent to which we are contributing.
We end up with two polarized camps; the "global-warmists" and the "deniers". And we are all supposed to take a side, choose our weapons and go for the throat. Which in itself detracts from sensible, logical ideas like self-sufficiency, less consumerism, clean energy, sustainable environments etc. (because they become part of the whole debate and no longer just a neat thing we could/should all do).
This makes me very cross (can you tell), but I have given up waffling about it too much (this post excluded) and simply invest in my own sustainability and remain healthily sceptical about any new GW science.
The actual problem, of course, is that the bad science and the political happen, in this case, to agree.
There will always be bad science to support an idea that is politically useful. The superficial quality of the science, its apparent professionalism, depends on the power and wealth that depend on the political idea. That is sufficient to explain the prestige and apparent professionalism behind global warming.
On the other hand, every issue has its cranks and skeptics, and whenever somebody stands to lose a lot of money because of an increase in human understanding, they will fight against it, demonize it, and cast doubt on it as effectively as possible. Cranks can tell a compelling story of the establishment's arrogant dismissal of them and refusal to engage intellectually, but their very unreasonableness creates the story. Sane, successful people exploit their position to marginalize cranks because debating with cranks on an intellectual level is a waste of time and effort. And the plum prize for a band of cranks is an aging genius of yesteryear, declining in his powers and feeling ignored and left behind by younger competitors.
On the other hand, "everything-fun-is-bad-for-you" hair shirt crowd has definitely moved on from Sex to Consumption, and they're joined with the "we-privileged-deserve-nothing-we-have" hair shirt crowd. Attacking our primary energy source is a game-ending strike for people who are against consumption, so you can count on their instant unexamined enthusiasm for the idea. (I'm one of these, though a lazy and indifferent one.)
On the other hand....
On the other hand, I'm never going to get anywhere reasoning like this.
simply invest in my own sustainability and remain healthily sceptical about any new GW science
A cop out, to be sure, but I can't come up with anything better.
Please call those who disagree with AGW theory "skeptics". The use of the word "deniers" is pejorative, and seems meant to imply they are "denying reality."
His use of the word "fraud" seems well supported considering the amount of scientific fraud that has gone on here, to such a degree that you, for instance, appear to be open minded but generally unaware of the evidence against AGW. (This is not a criticism of you, just using you as an example of the type of information that gets out.) Further, the actions in climategate, which involved adding an artificial factor to create warming, are fairly considered to be fraud. If this factor were known and the full data were presented to people, then it would be good science as it would be attempting to compensate--- but then I'm being very generous because I believe a fair assessment would show the factor is not based on science but based on a need to show warming.
Sorry, in case it is not clear I am personally sceptic of a lot of the global warming science [but not climate change, gladly there is at least solid factual information there]. I did deliberately put deniers in quotes :)
The fraud bit I was referring to other posts in this thread that were talking about monetary fraud. As I mentioned, I agree there is a lot of bad, often fraudulent, science going on in this field.
And yet, as a sceptic, I don't see why, for example, sustainable energy is a bad idea. Or why it is even part of the debate, rather than standing on its own merits :)
My position is that the initiation of force is immoral. So, if all the Venture Capitalists in Silicon Valley think that there is something going in the green energy sector and they want to pour a bunch of money into it, more power to them.
Unfortunately, I suspect that the recent popularity of this sector among them is more to due with the expectation of buckets of cash coming from government than seeing a viable economic model to exploit.
Viable economic models work to improve society, and they produce profits that turn around and can be invested in a variety of potentially viable technologies and economic models. It is a virtuous cycle.
So, in that context, I also am in favor of "sustainable energy" as well. I just have a problem with government sticking guns in people's faces, taking the money they would have used for their babies medicine and giving it to someone who created an politically favored business in order to get government money.
I'm not saying your position is any different, just that when government gets involved things get confused. People forget that there is a huge difference between VC money and government money.
Also, I apologize as it seems I misunderstood your use of the word "deniers".
>just that when government gets involved things get confused.
Agreed. Because the government is not really all that interested, at the end of the day, in the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
> Also, I apologize as it seems I misunderstood your use of the word "deniers".
My fault. I used "global-warmists" instead of "alarmists" because the word slipped my mind. So it does look like I come down on one side of that sentence :)
The problem with the "climate change debate" is that it is a) political and b) full of bad science. The actual problem, of course, is that the bad science and the political happen, in this case, to agree.
To those decrying his strong assertions of fraud, I agree there is a little too much hyperbole in his resignation. However I think he is absolutely right that the money is skewing the science, as much as the politics.
What the scientists don't seem to understand is that a politician probably doesn't really care what happens in the future (so long as it does not happen in his/her lifetime) they are more interested in the political advantage it is offering. This is the same for pretty much any wide-scale "popular" crisis that occurs (e.g. the bird flu "pandemic").
And, so, we are in this weird situation where a very serious issue is facing us (well, facing us in a few generations) but most of the work seems to relate to arguing, using it to political advantage and scaring the public.
Rather than actually doing anything very much.
And the public have absolutely no idea what to believe, expect or do (except for some vague notion that maybe they should invest in a solar panel). The media have been handed the words "a scientific consensus" which confuses people even more, and means absolutely nothing. The media and the politicos have spun the whole thing into a mess of fear in the populace; who has this sense that there is a major urgency and we should be panicking. When clearly, that is a silly response.
The truth, sadly, is that nothing is at all clear at this point, apart from the fact we are seeing some form of, probably quite significant, climate change some portion of which is out fault. And only a developing sense of what to do about it and what it will lead to (environment wise). Anyone who claims to be able to predict the outcome, from this point on, with any degree of certainty I am quite happy to call a fraud. Ditto for anyone that claims conclusively to have shown the extent to which we are contributing.
We end up with two polarized camps; the "global-warmists" and the "deniers". And we are all supposed to take a side, choose our weapons and go for the throat. Which in itself detracts from sensible, logical ideas like self-sufficiency, less consumerism, clean energy, sustainable environments etc. (because they become part of the whole debate and no longer just a neat thing we could/should all do).
This makes me very cross (can you tell), but I have given up waffling about it too much (this post excluded) and simply invest in my own sustainability and remain healthily sceptical about any new GW science.