mikeh, on 2014-December-03, 11:45, said:
One of my favourite writers is the late Stephen Jay Gould. He often wrote essays about scientific ideas that held sway for some time and are now forgotten or, if remembered, are ridiculed. He strove to put those ideas within the context of what was then understood about the way the world worked and, seen in that light, was able to show that those who came up with the ideas were actually (usually) intelligent thinkers, led astray by a lack of knowledge.
Thus I am very much aware of how science has moved in fits and starts. Mendelian genetics, and plate tectonics are classics of that type. However, the global warming debate seems unlikely to be subject to revision in the same manner as the mechanism of inheritance of physical attributes or the understanding of how Africa and South America seemed to 'match' in outline and geological features.
Indeed, the current research on climate change is more akin to the development of ideas that cause a change in the existing paradigm than to the notion that the IPCC (for one) opinion represents the old school that is about to be found to have been wrong.
More importantly, and disquietingly, the 'debate' on global warming largely pits profoundly and proudly ignorant people, who disdain science and understanding, against those who have dedicated their lives to learning about how this aspect of the world actually works.
This is especially true in the US, where it is commonplace for republican leaders to preface their refusal to accept scientific opinion as valid by saying 'I'm not a scientist but.....' where what follows is a rejection of science in favour of 'common sense' or biblically based beliefs.
Now this troll purports to quote 'science', but does so very selectively, and out of context. He correctly, as far as I can see, identifies instances in which the data suggests that some scenarios forecast by some researchers have not materialized. I don't know of any scientist who claims that his or her modelling is infallible. I don't know of any who claim that their understanding of climate is perfect or that forecasts are even as reliable as predicting tomorrow's weather.
Thus if one is willing to be intellectually dishonest, it is easy to show that some, and indeed many, of the predictions made over the last 30 years have not come true and to then argue that therefore the entire notion is a fraud or an error. Easy, but unfair and on a fundamental level, dishonest.
One can legitimately, from what little I know, argue that human understanding of the precise details of how global warming occurs and how it will develop is incomplete. That is not a valid argument to do nothing.
Imagine 4 of us standing in a road, seeing a large truck coming towards us. One of us argues that the truck is going slowly enough that we will only be seriously injured. Another, no, the truck's speed is such that we will be killed. A third person says that maybe we are miss-interpreting the direction of the truck....it will probably miss us. What should the 4th person do? Stand still and wait, or move to one side?
The climate change deniers are saying, in essence, that we should do nothing to get out of the way, since it is possible that we have miss-interpreted the direction of the truck. Actually, it is worse than that. To make the analogy more accurate, we need 101 people in the road, and 97 of them are saying we need to get out of the way, 3 are saying we stand put, and the 1 blind person, who needs to rely on the advice of others, prefers to listen to the 3 'truck-deniers'.
Or you have some symptoms. Tests are run. 100 medical specialists say you need surgery or you will die. 3 say that maybe the tests were inconclusive. Would you have surgery? Or would you go to your local Fox news personality for another opinion?
It's easy to find excuses not to accept bad news. Easy but foolish.
The problem with the debate about global warming is that too many people think there are only two "sides" to the debate, and that one or the other must be right. On one side, we have the group claiming that the warming experienced over the past century has all been manmade, and will multiply several fold in the coming years. On the other side, is the group claiming that all the warming was natural, and that mankind contributes little to the overall equation. They call each other "deniers" and "alarmists" in order to belittle their opponents in the eyes of the general populous. To state that only one of these groups is proudly ignorant and disdains science and understanding is a stretch.
What many people fail to realize is that these two groups are not only far apart from each other, but far apart from the scientific measurements and observations. Both sides claim that most scientists must agree with their position, because so few agree with the opposing view. The IPCC stated that there are very confident that at least half of the warming since 1950 is manmade (~0.3C). Most surveys of scientists show support for a 50:50 natural to manmade ratio, with others ranging from 0 to 100%. Based on the scientific data, warming as been fairly constant overall since the 19th century, with oscillating periods of greater and lesser warming. Each of the extreme sides will choose that period of data which best exemplies their position as proof of their stance; 1979-1998 or 1998-2014, depending on which side one is aligned. The same is done with sea ice measurements. Sea level rise has been fairly constant during that timeframe also; both the satellite data and tidal gauges show no trend change over their respective measurement periods. Additionally, using a particularly hot or cold, wet or dry year to claim support is extremely short-sighted and highly misleading.
I agree that our understanding of how global warming will develop is limited, as is our understanding of the global climate system. If mankind has caused global temperatures to rise 0.3C over the past 65 years, what justification would anyone have to state a significant deviation from this observation? Since mankind's contribution is expected to continue (whatever its exact portion), nature is unlikely to continue much longer. Some people seem to refer to the debate over AGW as the arguments between the two extreme positions mentioned previously, and conclude that there really is not a debate. Probably true, as neither of these sides really debates anything, rather it is better described as a barroom brawl. The debate that is occurring is over how much mankind and nature have contributed to the warming, and what the future results entail. This is critical in determing how much money need be spent immediately to alleviate potential problems, as opposed to spending money to develop the best long-term solutions, which benefit the most people. First world problems differ substantially from third world ones.
In your previous truck analogy, it may be better to say that its brakes fail going downhill. Thus, we have a combination of the truck's velocity and gravity weighing on the situation, with the debate over the initial speed of the vehicle. Standing in the middle of the road at the bottom of the hill would be foolish. However, standing at the top of the next hill would be a completely different story. Some deny that the intial velocity of the truck has any influence, but others deny the effects of gravity.
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