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The Heretical Freeman Dyson
dublin writes "Big-thinker Freeman Dyson has written a new essay in which he points out the need for heretics in science, and goes on to gore some sacred cows, including global climate change: 'My first heresy says that all the fuss about global warming is grossly exaggerated ... There is no doubt that parts of the world are getting warmer, but the warming is not global ... When I listen to the public debates about climate change, I am impressed by the enormous gaps in our knowledge, the sparseness of our observations and the superficiality of our theories ... All our fashionable worries and all our prevailing dogmas will probably be obsolete in fifty years. My heresies will probably also be obsolete. It is up to [the people of 2070] to find new heresies to guide our way to a more hopeful future.'"
He spoke out against global warming!
BURN HIM!!!!
also, first
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Hmm, this seems like a rather easy prediction to make: that all the arguments for, and against, the current view on global warming will be obsolete in 50 years.
Unfortunately, the debate on global warming has been so politicized that I can indeed believe that any theories currently present will be obsolete in a small number of years. Has it occured to anyone else that the huge right-vs-left debate over global warming has actually repressed all of the scientific facts on global warming? I'd love to see original scientific research on the question on global warming, but it seems that everyone with an opinion on global warming is merely a pundit for either the right or the left.
Perhaps, somewhat arrogantly, I consider myself an intelligent scientist (though not a climatologist). I would love to read the research on the subject of global warming, minus the political punditry, and make my own decisions on the problem.
He is correct. It is important that people speak against the common wisdom, otherwise we would never learn anything. That being said, 99% of the time when people claim stuff against common sense, they are talking bullshit.
Write your own Choose Your Own Adventure. http://www.freegameengines.org/gamebook-engine/
"They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown." - Carl Sagan
The question is, is Dyson being an Einstein, or a Bozo? For my money, on climate change, I'm going with the latter.
are getting warmer."
Doesn't that quote suggest he's just been confused by the term global warming and doesn't understand the basic issue at all? I'm convinced it's because of people like him that the popular term was modified to "Climate Change". It's about the energy the heat adds to the system, not the fact that it gets warm everywhere. It could well get colder in a lot of places, all it does is make things more extreme. Like pushing a swing just that little bit harder, it might go up higher but unless you move it's the back swing that will have you not fathering any children.
We need more people to stand up against the global warming onslaught.
I wear my eyepatch and parrot every day. What do YOU do to prevent global warming?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
How can you defend this guy? He's responsible for Skynet, for God's sake! Either that or he sells vacuum cleaners. Either way, he's dangerous and must be stopped.
Ultimately what he attacks is being stuck in an ideology, and that heresies are essential for science. He isn't claiming that his heresies are true - just that scientists are too stuck in an ideology to even give them proper attention.
The Raven
Newsweek has an excellent review of the evolution and funding of the climate change denial movement. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20122975/site/newsweek /
It's fine that Dyson encourages scientific skepticism and debate, but in life, we manage risk by taking actions according to best estimates of that risk. If, according to the latest consensus science, the likelihood of serious consequences for human-modulated climate change is, say, 1%, 5%, 10%, 20%, 50%, or 70%, our actions should reflect those likelihoods. The answer is not to do nothing until the likelihood is 98%. Policy should be proportional to risk, and there's a reasonable scientific consensus that human behavior is 70% to 80% likely to be part of the changes currently observed, and there's a higher chance that these changes are going to have some costly effects regardless of cause. It likewise seems reasonable to encourage more alternative fuels research.
Burning him will release more greenhouse gases, you insensitive clod!
Medical protocols are a bad analogy, too. The resulting bad outcomes:
Procedure doesn't work: Death
Procedure isn't attempted: Death
Obviously in a case like that, even a 10% chance is worth taking.
What if it's a new foot anti-fungal with a 10% chance of causing death? You'll find the 90% confidence somewhat lacking (I hope).
You are accepting the answers realclimate.org provides as absolute truth. Guess what? That's also a politically motivated site. They are not interested in trying to present all the information of GW, they are interested in pushing the case that it is real and humans are causing it. So if you take that as your only information source, yes I'm sure you think it is all settled, there aren't any issues. However not everyone sees it that way. I've done some research and before becoming overwhelmed by all the bad science and bullshit, I came to the conclusion that it is NOT as clear cut as many people want to present. I found an awful lot of data being used incorrectly, a massive amount of using computer models to "prove" things (models don't prove things, they help you figure out what should happen so you can test it for proof), a great deal of appeal to "consensus" and a continual demonizing of anyone who wasn't a believer.
So sorry, but I remain unconvinced and a site like realclimate.org does nothing to change that. What I need is what I consider to be good, unbiased research. So far, I've had real trouble finding it. Things that sounded reasonable in the new bite fall apart when you read the actual journal article and investigate it a bit.
If you've reviewed the data and find it to be clear and convincing, that's great, but don't assume everyone has to agree with you, or that a person who doesn't is an idiot.
1) The fact that the models may be wrong only means we have to lean *harder* on carbon output. We now know from the ice core records that the climate is not metastable and can in fact shift rapidly when you push it like we are *right now*. The fact that the models aren't perfect doesn't *decrease* the risk it *increases* it. If you're driving on a road where a bridge may have collapsed (e.g. let's say you're in the US on an interstate and the president is a Republican
2) The business with top soil is amusing but hardly very useful. There's lots of complicated data about topsoil out there (go google young man...) but pretty much all of it suggests that we're loosing megatons of it in the US. In the rest of the world we're loosing it much faster. So what's Freeman's suggestion? Increase topsoil. Really helpful that one. By saying "saying that the problems are grossly exaggerated" he's going to get the giant corrupt corp. agribusiness interests of the world to change all their short-term profit-oriented processes to increase topsoil? No. They'll point to the "what me worry?" part of his article and ignore the rest just like the parent.
I hope we get really lucky and somehow there's some hidden feedback loop in the climate that bails us out. Cause the way every off the reservation comment by some cranky old scientist gets played up by the media means there's no way in hell we're gonna get out of this by rational planning
One final word: No computer model of atmosphere and ocean can hope to predict the way we shall manage our land. Actually you don't need a computer model. Just work for a big corporation (instead of say, the eden-like Institute for Advanced Studies for most of your life), know that large corporations are who are going to be managing that land, and the answer is clear. We're gonna *rape* it. Cause next year's topsoil doesn't effect this quarter's profits so it's not material.
When you're a sociopath waiting for marriage don't enter into the equation, if you know what I mean...
At least you do if you are doing real science. Really doing science isn't about running a computer simulation to show something, saying "This proves it," and then shouting down anyone who disagrees with you as an idiot. Real science is in fact bending over backwards to try to find anything you can wrong with your theory and testing it. Because you see we don't prove things true, we show them to be not false. That's not the same thing. Doing an experiment that supports a theory doesn't show the theory is true, it provides evidence it isn't false. Every time you test it again, you are more sure it is true, every time you come up with an alternate hypothesis and falsify that, you are more sure it is true. Once you've done everything you (and others) can think of to try and prove your theory false and failed, then you say its true (though you may be proven wrong later).
Real science, proper science, is going for proof to a very high standard. I'll quote Richard Feynman since he said it very well:
"It's a kind of scientific integrity,
a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of
utter honesty--a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if
you're doing an experiment, you should report everything that you
think might make it invalid--not only what you think is right about
it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and
things you thought of that you've eliminated by some other
experiment, and how they worked--to make sure the other fellow can
tell they have been eliminated.
Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be
given, if you know them. You must do the best you can--if you know
anything at all wrong, or possibly wrong--to explain it. If you
make a theory, for example, and advertise it, or put it out, then
you must also put down all the facts that disagree with it, as well
as those that agree with it. There is also a more subtle problem.
When you have put a lot of ideas together to make an elaborate
theory, you want to make sure, when explaining what it fits, that
those things it fits are not just the things that gave you the idea
for the theory; but that the finished theory makes something else
come out right, in addition.
In summary, the idea is to try to give all of the information to
help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the
information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or
another."
If you want to argue for a much lower standard, ok, but understand that isn't good science, that's pseudoscience. Pseudoscience is where you have some experiments, maybe contrived maybe not, to support your claims and that's all. You don't try to prove them false, in fact you ignore any contrary evidence. Instead you rely heavily on personal testimony and showing how many people agree with you (a large consensus). You don't go for strong evidence, you go for strong persuasion.
You can do that if you like, but please don't confuse it with good science.
It was one data set that contained an error, and a fairly marginal one at that. At the cost of repeating myself, go take the corrected data, plot it, and see that not much has changed. Of course, saying "the hottest year is no longer 1998, it's 1934! Its teh climate illuminati!" makes more of a headline.
You conveniently seem to forget that:
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