Grant money is distributed based on the perception of a problem. Nobody would be funding climate change research if the scientific consensus is that it wasn't a problem.
I am 100% a believer in anthropogenic climate change, but it's ridiculous to claim that there's no financial incentive for researchers to find positive results.
There is "A-LOT" more money in selling Protein based products than there is in any pro-climate change product.
I'd like to hear what the positive financial incentive is for promoting climate change? How are they making money?
Whereas, with food products, there is a clear and long history of the 'science' being warped by the financial incentives.
Grant money, this is not a mystery. That's what all research labs are on the hunt for, at all times.
The person chasing grant money is getting a few thousands of dollars.
The person chasing a food product is getting billons.
The incentives are very different in scale.
It is just anecdotal but:
All the researchers I know are driving old used cars and scraping by. Nobody is rich.
All the big firm researchers/marketers I know are living very comfortable upper class lives, and don't want to jeopardize that with any 'counter findings'.
How hard is this to understand:
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” ― Upton Sinclair, I, Candidate for Governor
I mean I don't blame them, I like my job too, but we should recognize the incentive exists.
Since 1993, OMB has reported over $154 billion in funding for federal climate change activities, spread across the government—raising questions about fragmentation, overlap, or duplication.
https://www.gao.gov/products/gao-18-223
For comparison, this was Ensure's sales in 1996, not profit.
In 1996, Ensure had sales of about $300 million and accounted for 80% of protein supplement sales
$154 billion in 30 years for a whole field like climate change, is ~$5 billion a year.
I don't think that the whole supplement industry in the US alone is making less than that.
Also that GAO report was published Apr 30, 2018. Publicly Released: May 30, 2018, so 25 years.
I don't understand where this comparison goes.
Any study sponsored by any given industry, that may have any effect on their bottom line, are generally treated with suspicion because the whole point of private ventures is to increase profits. The narrative is driven by that, not the other way around.
In contrast, climate research would happen with or without climate change happening.
>There's a lot of money being thrown into climate research. All those researchers like their jobs. We have a massive oversupply of academics and scientists with PhDs. Corporations aren't the only entities with perverse incentives.
>In contrast, climate research would happen with or without climate change happening.
Sure, but when something generates as much media attention and has as much fervor and staying power as climate change does, it gets a whole lot more funding. That's why most of what we hear as the consequence of climate change is absolute worst case scenarios. If people were to lose interest (fear), researchers would lose funding. Getting hit by an asteroid would be more devastating, but I'll bet it doesn't get nearly as much funding, because there isn't as much fervor.
https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasas-planetary-defense-b...
Nope, not even a fraction of a fraction.
Perhaps because the chance of an asteroid triggering an extinction level event is infinitesimal, whereas climate change is a very palpable, ongoing issue?
Why did we spent so much money developing vaccines to address the COVID-19 pandemic, when there are supervolcanoes that could end all life on Earth as we know it?
> We have a massive oversupply of academics and scientists with PhDs. Corporations aren't the only entities with perverse incentives.
Corporations, especially publicly traded ones, will almost always pursue maximizing profits. That's quite literally the fiduciary duty of the C-Suite towards shareholders.
Academia really is not the most profitable endeavor. Spending 10+ years as a researcher to make less money than a software engineer sounds too dumb for someone smart enough to get a PhD, because it is [0]:
> For example, at Pennsylvania State University, professors in the earth and mineral sciences department made an average salary of $157,773, which was below the universitywide average of $166,731. Professors in earth and environmental sciences earned $98,567 on average at Iowa State University, compared with the average salary of $134,039.
It's worth noting that, to become an associate university professor, one needs to earn a MSc and a PhD, and spend handful of years as a postdoctorate.
Grants aren't "pocket money" for researchers either. In fact they aren't even awarded to individuals, but projects and organizations:
> [...] Dr. Hayhoe explained how a $1.1 million grant she received was spent: It was divided over four years, was split with her university for facilities costs, helped pay for a graduate assistant and covered the costs of conferences, laptops and publishing in scientific journals.
In short, I don't think these two are remotely comparable.
[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/27/us/politics/climate-repor...
https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasas-planetary-defense-b...
>https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasas-planetary-defense-b...
You gotta be trolling. You liked the same article I did. Must be that fervor I was talking about. Do you even know what you are arguing against?
In 1996 Protein shakes were still new. Back then people using whey were 'cutting' edge.
Today: >"The global protein supplements market size was USD 25.34 billion in 2022 and is projected to grow from USD 27.41 billion in 2023 to USD 51.81 billion by 2030 at a CAGR of 9.5% during 2023-2030."
25 Billion a Year.
Meanwhile. Your Climate numbers on that linked site.
Yes, something like 8 Billion a Year on Research.
A pittance, that is to carry out the studies, not get paid.
And, A big chunk of that is on Technology, not 'proving if it's real or not', but on actually creating new tech, which goes into expanding the economy.
Joe Blow Researchers are not rich people.
>Joe Blow Researchers are not rich people.
Neither are cops, but there is plenty of incentive to fear monger crime to keep their headcount up and their budgets increasing. Do you not think there is an incentive to keep research grants for climate change flowing?
Here's something that came out recently. I don't know if you've read it, but it's interesting. I know a few people in the academic world and they are always desperate to get research grants to keep the lights on.
https://www.thefp.com/p/i-overhyped-climate-change-to-get-pu...
I did read that article. Isn't one of the findings was that the data that was left out didn't change the results? Leaving it out just helped clarify the results? I guess if people did the opposite, they could include hundreds of 'possible' things that would really muddy the results.
Everyone in every form of writing is taught to stick to the basics and leave out extraneous 'possibilities' to clarify the message. That is just being succinct. If it doesn't change the results, then it is a matter of style.
I'm just saying the scale is orders of magnitude different.
You were equating the incentives of pretty lowly researchers scrounging for grants to do very basic research, to big money food production companies with huge incentives to sway opinions.
The climate scientist is not promoting a product, sure they want to get the next grant, and that is just how research is. But that is a really low bar. I don't think any grants specify that the results of the previous grant better result in "X".
That would be like saying, "I better produce something that proves that String Theory is real or I wont get another grant". -- OOOPS. Might have contradicted myself since string theory is garbage.
So. All studies, as all humans, have bias. All academic fields have bias.
So with all studies in all fields, the bias has to be factored in.
It was only a few years ago really that hundreds of studies said smoking was not only safe, but could be healthy. But those were corporate studies.
And like the protein study, there is just far greater scales of bias in corporate funded studies. They have bigger money, bigger stakes, more to protect.
The lowly climate scientist isn't getting much beyond a citation and enough money for dinner.
This narrative that there is some big money in climate science is a full on press of BS to discredit it, by the same people producing biased studies to disprove it. Just like with Tabaco companies.
I wasn't defending the corporation.
>The climate scientist is not promoting a product, sure they want to get the next grant, and that is just how research is. But that is a really low bar. I don't think any grants specify that the results of the previous grant better result in "X".
So you agree, there are perverse incentives to keep climate research funding flowing. That was my assertion.
You are really taking some generic statements about how all research must guard against bias, about how bias is a characteristic in all humans. And then micro-focusing on climate science seeming to assert that this one particular field is much more biased than all other fields.
To do this you need to come up with some proof.
Saying all research contains some bias, climate science is research, thus climate science is biased, -> Is really just trolling.
You know gravity is just a theory, it is researched, that doesn't mean research on gravity is biased thus gravity is not real.
I don't believe I asserted climate science was much more biased. I was just acknowledging the perverse incentive. I did assert it was very well funded though.
If you are saying all research, across all fields, has a "perverse incentive", that the entire research system across all disciplines is 'perverse', then I might agree.
There was whole thread on HN about this subject recently, sorry, don't have link.
BUT. In all the complaining about how research is currently done, I've not seen anybody come up with a credible alternative. You still need funding, still need a way to filter out crap, so still need some reviews by 'experts', that would still have biases.
Ok how much is the supplements field making a year …. 30billion in the US . That’s how you compare a field with a field …. Your comparison sucks dude.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/235801/retail-sales-of-v...