The climate change scandal

[sunnyside]

I decided to mosey over to Rasmussen to see how climate change polls are doing.

Apparently between the fact in the last year or so global temps have actually cooled, websites and adds like http://co2isgreen.org , and now this, the percentage of Americans who believe human activity is causing global warming has plumetted to 37% and is presumably still in a downward trend. And whenever(at least the ones I saw) they pose a choice betwwen taxes or jobs and the environment the environment loses.

I wonder what public opinion is in the EU. Anybody know?

[Sionnach Glic]

Mostly a case of "great, this is going to set us back a few years" amongst the people I know.

And they're quite right. Every right-winger on the planet is going to take this as proof that global warming is some sort of evil liberal plot.

[Mikey]

Indeed. This is just the sort of toe-hold for which they've been looking.

Science is meant to be objective (so is almost everything ) but it's run by humans who don't by nature operate in a purely objective fashion </understatement of the year>. Again, the damage to the image of "science" as an institution is done.

Yep - the problem with science is that its furtherance is conducted by (human) scientists. As Colin Hay once sang, "I love the world... except for all the people."

[Tyyr]

The problem is simple, money.

Scientists are like anyone else, they've got bills to pay. The people who give them money have agendas. Well, if you return a result that doesn't support the person who gave you money's agenda do you think they'll come back to give you more? Probably not. Without money, you don't get to do research, go to conferences, wear that bitching white coat, oh and do other little things like make your house payment.

So, while scientists may try to be objective and even maybe really want to be impartial there is always that subtle, and occasionally not so subtle pressure to deliver a product rather than pure research.

[sunnyside]

Mostly a case of "great, this is going to set us back a few years" amongst the people I know.

And they're quite right. Every right-winger on the planet is going to take this as proof that global warming is some sort of evil liberal plot.

I decided to poke around for something more quantitative.

In Briton it looks like belief is going down as well, though the doubters aren't the majority like they are in the US.

They nearly are though, and might be before too long.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... d-man.html

[IanKennedy]

Yes, so much so that we're currently in one of the least volcanically active times in the history of ever.

Compared with pre-history perhaps. But compared with recorded history, I'm not sure that's true.

[IanKennedy]

This certainly throws a monkey wrench into the works.

A warming trend in recent decades is fact, but the explanation is not -- and certainly not any predictions made by that theory. Now that theory certainly stands to have it's merits re-evaluated, but as noted above the political damage is done already.

Science is meant to be objective (so is almost everything ) but it's run by humans who don't by nature operate in a purely objective fashion </understatement of the year>. Again, the damage to the image of "science" as an institution is done.

As far as climate change action (worth little more than the paper these plans are written on as long as China and India are around anyway...) the "economic" arguments could be set to take on a new tone if the "rock solid" scientific backing evaporates. Of course sensible action to foster efficiency and reduce pollution in general (yes, it does more than warm the earth!) is still a very good idea.

I'm not in anyway suggesting that we don't do something to try and help the situation.

[IanKennedy]

The problem is simple, money.

Scientists are like anyone else, they've got bills to pay. The people who give them money have agendas. Well, if you return a result that doesn't support the person who gave you money's agenda do you think they'll come back to give you more? Probably not. Without money, you don't get to do research, go to conferences, wear that bitching white coat, oh and do other little things like make your house payment.

So, while scientists may try to be objective and even maybe really want to be impartial there is always that subtle, and occasionally not so subtle pressure to deliver a product rather than pure research.

That's simply not true, at least not in our department. We work very hard to be Independent of the people we get our money from. We publish bad results as well as good results. After all if something is not good for you we have a medical obligation to tell people not to be using it.

[Tyyr]

Before I go off the deep end, where do you work?

If its something directly affecting people, such as drug testing, then fudging facts is far more dangerous pushing the risk/reward balance towards the risk side. It still happens though, there have been multiple cases in the States of drugs that had no business making it to market getting there due to poorly done research and testing.

Of course you go to something like anthropogenic global warming where actually nailing someone's ass to the wall would be damn near impossible and the risk/reward balance can go the other way.

[IanKennedy]

Before I go off the deep end, where do you work?

The University of Oxford, Diabetes Trials Unit. We're a medical trials unit working specifically in the field of Type 2 diabetes.

If its something directly affecting people, such as drug testing, then fudging facts is far more dangerous pushing the risk/reward balance towards the risk side. It still happens though, there have been multiple cases in the States of drugs that had no business making it to market getting there due to poorly done research and testing.

Of course you go to something like anthropogenic global warming where actually nailing someone's ass to the wall would be damn near impossible and the risk/reward balance can go the other way.

[SuperSaiyaMan12]

I'd like to point out the author of this article compares Liberals to Nazi's and is the most untrustworthy author you'll meet.

[sunnyside]

I'd like to point out the author of this article compares Liberals to Nazi's and is the most untrustworthy author you'll meet.

Do you mean the author of the article in my first post or the author of the article a couple posts before here about the British?

In either case the articles were primarily selected by merit of being recent and high in the google ranking. Probably because my usual newsfeeds are doing a piss poor job of covering this side of these issues. I.e. CNN covers the topic, however their video/article is from members of the global climate community saying that it's no big deal without actually even explaining what the deal was, forcing me to look elsewhere.

SImilarly the BBC doesn't seem to be doing a good job of covering the increasing global warming skepticism in the population.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/p ... 386625.stm is about all I could find. Though interesting, it only vaguely mentions what is probably the poll referenced in the other article.

This may be the first case of what could be considered liberal bias in the mainstream media that I've actually noticed. Usually I'm of the position that most mainstream media like CNN/BBC are either fairly balanced or are chasing profit/viewers which sometimes makes them act as if they have a liberal bias when conservatives hold power.


Though still, they aren't covering stuff up, just being a bit selective in how it's presented.

[Aaron]

As far as climate change action (worth little more than the paper these plans are written on as long as China and India are around anyway...) the "economic" arguments could be set to take on a new tone if the "rock solid" scientific backing evaporates. Of course sensible action to foster efficiency and reduce pollution in general (yes, it does more than warm the earth!) is still a very good idea.

You know what the problem with the China and India argument is? It may well be true at the moment that what the West does is pointless as long as they don't give a shit, however when it comes around to the the time that they've reached our level of development and we start pressuring them even more to stop, they'll go; "why the fuck should we? You didn't!" and they would be right.

Essentially we'll be broadcasting our hypocrisy even more then we already do.

[Mikey]

Yes, so much so that we're currently in one of the least volcanically active times in the history of ever.

Compared with pre-history perhaps. But compared with recorded history, I'm not sure that's true.

Well, of course. How else would you even discuss something of this scale? Compared to the scale of geological epochs and eras, all of the historical period must needs be treated as a unified period. Obviously you refer to things like Krakatoa and such; but as I said, that has to be considered to be part of "this" current period.

[IanKennedy]

Yes, so much so that we're currently in one of the least volcanically active times in the history of ever.

Compared with pre-history perhaps. But compared with recorded history, I'm not sure that's true.

Well, of course. How else would you even discuss something of this scale? Compared to the scale of geological epochs and eras, all of the historical period must needs be treated as a unified period. Obviously you refer to things like Krakatoa and such; but as I said, that has to be considered to be part of "this" current period.

Well he theories are about explaining the rise in CO2 in the atmosphere in recent times. Given that fact we should look at what's happened during that period across all sources of CO2. Volcanoes are a major source of CO2 so it's only right to look at them so see what part they are playing in our readings.