On the Morality of Global Warming Criticism | Hacker News Reader

On the Morality of Global Warming Criticism

wmbriggs.com

20 pointsmseebach26 comments

Let’s remind everybody that the truth is not decided by a vote

One leading indicator that there's something fishy about the case for anthropogenic global warming is that people talk of a "scientific consensus" on the subject. There's a scientific consensus on Newtonian mechanics, too, but no one bothers to mention it.

There is a scientific consensus on Darwinian evolution, and it gets mentioned all the time. That argument is used against non-scientists challenging scientific consensus.

Darwinian evolution provides the basis upon which all modern biology is constructed -- It is a positive theory, it enables research and conclusions. Whereas AGW is a conclusion.

I'm not sure what the relevance of that is. Yes, from a scientific perspective Darwinism is more important and interesting because it is very fundamental. Is that the difference you are referring to?

What does that have to do with scientific consensus? Are you saying that scientific consensus is a convincing argument for "positive theories."

*BTW, I agree with you that consensus, even scientific consensus is not watertight. It is however, something. It's limitations are the limitations of the scientific institution, which are many. Still, overall science produces knowledge about the world and is our best way of doing so. Scientific consensus is not unchallengeable but it is difficult to convincingly challenge and it does put a burden on the challenger.

I don't know if it puts the burden on the challenger, as Feynman said the duty of the scientist is to bend over backwards to explain all the ways that you might be wrong. The climate scientists do not do this; in fact they claim to understand complex cyclical systems that they've observed a small fraction of. I think they've greatly overplayed their hand and were very sloppy in their thinking.

So in this case, I'd say the burden is on them - they are making extraordinary claims that are difficult to verify. Climate science is extremely hard - lack of data, a huge complex non-linear system, lack of understanding of subsystems -- yet they claim to have it figured out.

There is a scientific consensus on Darwinian evolution, and it gets mentioned all the time.

Yes, people should stop that. The evidence for evolution can stand on its own. I suspect the same is not the case for AGW.

The evidence for evolution can stand on its own.

You've never tried to talk to a Creationist, have you?

Of course I have, or at least I did in my misspent youth. Creationists are hard to convince. But you seem to suggest that, absent being able to convince a creationist with evidence, scientists should resort to naked argument from authority: "there's an overwhelming scientific consensus". But that doesn't work, either: few creationists have ever embraced evolution because of the "scientific consensus", and in the process it makes the actual arguments for evolution look weak.

There's a scientific consensus on Newtonian mechanics, too, but no one bothers to mention it.

It's also not relevant to any divisive political issues. If it were, you'd hear plenty about the consensus (in the negative sense, I guess, since Newtonian mechanics is fundamentally mistaken despite having good predictive value for some stuff).

Nobody has time to personally verify the entire edifice of modern science from the ground up; what's commonly accepted as true in science is precisely the set of things for which a broad consensus among people in the field exists. It's not a perfect solution, but it's worked well so far.

So, while the truth isn't decided by a vote, the best approximation of truth known to humanity pretty much is, and the people voting are experts in the field (which, I note, does not include Krugman or a variety of other people making very strong statements on the issue).

The moral wording of their argument, the appeal to morality, comes simply from an understanding of risk management. Risk being directly proportional to both the probability and to the impact of the event. The higher the stakes the less you want to take the risk, even in a potentially low probability occurrence.

Most people wouldn't think twice about walking along a garden wall if it were only a foot above the ground. If it were on the edge of a thousand foot drop, only a daredevil would attempt it.

In this case however, we are talking about (and I apologise for the tired cliché) walking a tight-wire over a thousand foot drop. It is likely, and the consequences are most likely fatal.

In this sense, it is entirely reasonable for a person or a group, on the strength of their conviction, to use strong moral language to hopefully avert the untimely deaths of millions, and understandable to attribute immorality to those who would continue to participate in the activities which they believe would cause these deaths.

Is that language effective? Probably not.. but what else do you do to convince a population who absolutely do not want to be convinced.

And, sure there is no scientific consensus on the science. Never is.. never has been. There is, however, consensus on the risk management.

Why don't critics of global warming ever present any evidence? That's how scientists do criticism. Any criticism of scientific findings without evidence is useless. Of course, the critics know this, and know that criticism without evidence cannot be refuted.

If you think that there's some sort of conspiracy going on, which is more likely -- energy companies making billions of dollars, or scientists making millions of dollars -- to be spending their money more effectively to change people's minds in order preserve their future profits?

Let's say 9 out of 10 doctors told you that you've got an 80% chance of dying if you don't change your diet. Would you think that those 9 doctors are conspiring against you? Or would you change your diet? That's pretty much the situation we're in here. (Except that the 1 doctor who disagrees also does a lot of work for the snack food industry.)

How about the doctors funded by tobacco companies who did "studies" and told people that smoking didn't cause cancer, did these doctors/companies commit a crime against humanity? I think it is reasonable to say they did.

> which is more likely -- energy companies making billions of dollars, or scientists making millions of dollars

If you want to do motive analysis, you need to look at the full picture. First off, you forgot one player -- governments "making" trillions of dollars, and in need of a project to justify themselves.

And second, energy companies jumped on the AGW wagon a long time ago. They need to be in the right place, ready to dish out expensive solutions to hungry governments. See http://sppiblog.org/news/independent-newspaper-readers-comme...

The opening line of the article: Paul Krugman, a columnist for the New York Times and winner of a prestigious banking prize (usually mistakenly called a “Nobel”)...

What the hell? He absolutely did win a Nobel Prize (technically, the "Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences").

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/2008/

Pedantry, combined with a swipe at the field.

"It is not one of the Nobel Prizes established by the will of Alfred Nobel during 1895, but is commonly identified with them." according to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Memorial_Prize_in_Economi...)

It's this kind of rhetoric that gives people pause: to debate the debatable doesn't make you a traitor or the committer of crimes against humanity. There's no need for such rhetoric if your position is solid and the facts speak for themselves. The existence of such rhetoric is prima facie evidence that your position is, at best, shaky.

What's worse is that this kind of incendiary talk is more indicative of a religious discussion than a scientific one as is the expectation of blind faith (in this case being the deliberate obstruction of attempts to get raw data and the refusal to publish such data).

At this point a constitutional lawyer could make a First Amendment argument that the US Federal government should be banned from saying anything about global warming on the grounds of the Establishment clause.

So we're pulling Bill Nye out of the mothballs now?

The way I see it Copenhagen couldn't get commitments from anyone and things have only gotten worse for Pro-GW side since then. It seems we're at least a decade away from legislation (assuming man-made GW is a valid theory) since no one is going to reshape their economy on "a maybe".

Given that I'd like to see two things.

1. Have the scientists turn back to the science and eliminate the measurement/methodology problems that have led to questions in the last 10 years.

2. Have the politicians and pundits turn their attention to funding and/or raising money for the literally millions of clean energy startups out there. Because the easiest fix here is energy entrepreneurialism. Space based Solar Power alone could fix this problem.

At least, that's what would happen in my perfect world

Nuclear energy could fix this problem in 5-6 years for about what we pay for coal, no need to go out on a limb with "space based solar". Sure it's cool, but a solution exists that is less toxic than what exists (nuclear radiation from coal) and is about the same price. Sounds like a no brainer to me.

The problem is that a lot of people are irrationally scared of anything with the word "nuclear" in it.

I don't think people are as scared of nuclear as they were in, say, the 80s. It might be time to try again.

> The problem is that a lot of people are irrationally scared of anything with the word "nuclear" in it.

A lot of people are also scared of spiders.

But that's not irrational. They have too many legs, and they bite!

Literally millions of cleantech startups? Space based solar power? What are you talking about?

> 2. Have the politicians and pundits turn their attention to funding and/or raising money for the literally millions of clean energy startups out there. Because the easiest fix here is energy entrepreneurialism. Space based Solar Power alone could fix this problem.

How about not. Politicians don't "raise money" - they take it, by force.

Invest your money in whatever you'd like. I hope that you get rich. But leave me out of it.

This article strongly reminded me of a certain essay[0]. Some people in the environmental movement are now saying "you shouldn't say our theory is false - to do so is heresy/treason/a crime against humanity" instead of "our theory is true".

[0] http://paulgraham.com/say.html

"First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win."

1 in 10 chance that it isn't man made, that's pretty good odds the enviros are wrong. No wonder they are starting to criticize the people rather than their ideas.

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