*Darrell,*
* *
*While I don’t agree with your portrayal of CRU, or Phil, let’s
assume, arguendo, you’re correct about the hubris, conspiracies, etc.
The bottom line is that CRU’s datasets for temperature increases are
virtually identical with the raw data from weather stations; in fact,
CRU’s findings are a little LOWER. At the end of the day I don’t give
a plug nickel about the foibles of scientists, who like all of us in
academia, the corporate world, and government, can demonstrate
pettiness and vindictiveness, and yes, frustration. Also, as AP’s
analysis, and that of Pew convincingly demonstrate, the conclusions at
CRU have been replicated in many other venues. If you want to allege
that all climatologists are engaged in this conspiracy (I guess for
the big bucks, ha ha; if you want to cash in, you become a skeptic
scientist, a lot less competition and a real pile of money supplied by
the folks who gave you the Global Climate Coalition), then all bets
are off. wil*
* *
* *
*Dr. Wil Burns, Editor in Chief***
*/Journal of International Wildlife Law & Policy/***
*1702 Arlington Blvd.***
*El Cerrito, CA 94530 USA*
*Ph: 650.281.9126*
*Fax: 510.779.5361*
*[email protected]*
<mailto:[email protected]>**
*http://www.jiwlp.com* <http://www.jiwlp.com/>**
*SSRN site (selected publications): **http://ssrn.com/author=240348***
*Skype ID: Wil.Burns*
* *
*From:* Darrell Whitman [mailto:[email protected]]
*Sent:* Monday, December 21, 2009 9:44 AM
*To:* Myanna Lahsen; [email protected]
*Cc:* Wallace, Richard; Global Environmental Politics Education ListServe
*Subject:* Re: Climategate Impacts
Greetings,
I woke up this morning to this long train of GEP emails on Copenhagen
and "climategate", all of which make interesting if now divergent
readings. I thought I'd add a comment to Myanna's, DG's, Mat and
Suzi's thread about East Anglia and the email fiasco as I have some
personal experience with this matter that casts it in a somewhat
different light and raises important questions that go beyond the
science debate. As it happened, I made several visits to EAU between
2001 and 2005 as part of my effort to get inside of the EU climate
policymaking process during my tenure with California's Resources
Agency. As it happened, I struck up a friendship with Tim O'Riodan -
true scholar and gentleman - who generously introduced me to Phil
Jones and the other scientists working at the Climate Research Unit.
As has been generally true with most scientists with whom I have
worked over the years, they were affable and enthusiastic about
sharing their research. Yet, as time went on something less flatering
began to emerge.
I think the problem crystalized in my mind during a conversation that
I had with Tim in his office in 2002, which coincided with
California's energy crisis and the emerging role of Enron in
manipulating the Western power grid to run up the price of
electricity. To my horror, Tim began extolling the "green" credentials
of Kenneth Lay and opined that he would be an excellent point around
which climate policymaking could be formed in the U.S. Of course, he
was oblivious as to the corporate Ken Lay and his criminal activities
onbehalf of Enron, which then suggested that Tim had a sadly limited
view of the world of real politics notwithstanding his many, many
years of writing about the politics of EU climate policy. From that
point forward, I began to look at the EAU and its role in British
climate policymaking differently, eventually coming to see how Tim has
built that program as the flagship U.K. climate research centre that
it now is as an extension of the U.K. government and not in any sense
as an independent research entity. Hence, the problem, as Nietzsche
observed, is that developing relationships with power shifts control
to the centre of power, even while developing an illusion of power at
the margins. For Tim and the CRU, this meant that a certain hubris
developed around their science knowledge and relationships with
policymakers, leading to the sad attacks on those, such as Sonja
Boehmer-Christiansen, who were not sufficiently enthusiastic about
their views and program. This problem, however, is not CRU's alone, as
I had similar experiences with other government associated programs in
the U.S. and Europe, and witnessed other instances of personal and
professional attacks on climate scientists and policy analysts who
dared raised questions or expressed reservations about the substance
and/or direction of climate policymaking.
The problem with the CRU emails is much deeper than the evidence they
provide of disputes within climate science: they represent a pattern
of isolation and arrogance that developed as CRU and EAU moved inside
the policymaking process. Knowing some of the participants and
retaining at least one friendship at CRU, I know they are deeply
troubled by what has happened, and at least a few of them recognize
how it came to be. What was lost there over the years - humility for
what they didn't know and respect for those with whom they had honest
disagreements, is always at risk when the politics of policymaking
intrudes into careers and creates hierarchies of power. I have worked
long enough (forty years) in community politics to know that publics
high and low, rich and poor, implicitly understand this problem, even
when they don't know the details, and their skepicism about climate
science, which in any case varies from culture to culture for a
variety of reasons, reflects their exclusion from it.
Best regards
Darrell Whitman
Davis, California
----- Original Message -----
*From:* Myanna Lahsen <mailto:[email protected]>
*To:* [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>
*Cc:* Wallace, Richard <mailto:[email protected]> ; Global
Environmental Politics Education ListServe
<mailto:[email protected]>
*Sent:* Monday, December 21, 2009 3:07 AM
*Subject:* Re: Climategate Impacts
Dear all,
In response to DG Webster's comment:
"If we all believed the same thing, then when we are wrong we will
be very very wrong. When there are many different beliefs, it's
more likely that some will be right, but less likely that we'll
all act together based on that person's position. Thus, as
frustrating as the stolen e-mails, the climate negotiations, and
the differences of opinion may be to the list, these are symptoms
of a profound aspect of human--and non-human--existence: variation
is key to our survival. That it could also be the source of our
downfall is ironic, but not inevitable."
The notion of societal strength through diversity of perspectives
is a common one in anthropology, and an important one, also in
climate science and associated politics. I personally do not
conflate the categories of "climate skeptics" and "climate
deniers," as many commentators and even scholars do; there are
very honest and earnest skeptics whose interpretations get muffled
by that, and they may indeed know part of the puzzle - see the
third of the articles listed below for an example of that. So it
is important to not alienate these scientists through use of such
language. Others may rightly be called deniers.
A key point I want to make in response to you, DG, is the
importance of attending to power inequities. There is a need to
analyze, expose and seek to transform the political and economic
systems that give such power to the voice of a few, in particular
those I indeed would call the "deniers." In other words,
recognition of strength through diversity should not result in
laissez-faire - in a position which overlooks the financial and
political machinery that explains why climate skepticism is so
strong in the US compared to other countries. I have developed
this argument in the first of the articles listed below.
I appreciate Susi's rejection of the term "ClimateGate"; those of
us who generally support the IPCC and are concerned about global
warming should seek not to use it, as its mere use places the IPCC
scientists in the position of accused and guilty by association.
Having analyzed US climate politics since the mid 1990s, this
hacked email incident is yet another instance of carefully crafted
theater, similar to that which was been crafted in the wake of the
releases of IPCC reports. The second of the references below is a
careful analysis of one such incident. Only with hindsight did the
key IPCC scientist involved also himself recognize that he was but
an unwilling actor in a staged event, which started at a hearing
in US Congress.
It seems to me that the important role for concerned analysts is
to seek ways to inform decision-makers and publics (those who are
disposed to listen and think, anyhow; the rest are a lost cause)
about both the limits and the strenghts of peer-reviewed science;
we need to develop a more critical understanding of what science
can and cannot do, getting rid of the erroneous "scientific
fundamentalism" that exists in US culture (cf. Chris Toumey's
book, Conjuring Science) without throwing the baby out with the
bath water - that is, while salvaging and strengthening
recognition of the importance of peer-reviewed science. Again, see
the first reference for my attempt to do that. The second article
serves the same purpose to the extent that it shows, in careful
detailed analysis, that the distortions and biases that prevail on
the anti-environmental side is much, much greater than those that
exist on the other side, and also in large measure disingenuous.
A key point, however, is that this kind of analysis needs to get
outside of the academy. My own article is a case in point. It's
difficult to do that, in current academic incentive structures and
an age of sound bites...which gets us to the problem of the
political economy and orientation of current educational and media
structures. By contrast to the work of most academics, the
theatrics of the anti-climate forces and associated scientists are
supported by the expensive services of top public relations firms.
Cheers,
Myanna
--
Myanna Lahsen,
Associate Researcher
Center for Earth System Science,
The National Institute for Space Research (INPE),
Av. dos Astronautas, 1.758 - Jd. Granja
São José dos Campos, SP 12227-010 Brazil
Telephone: Direct tel. number: +55 12 3945-7133; Secretary +55 12
3945 7126 / 3945-7127
Fax: +55 12 3945-7126
----------------------
*Lahsen, Myanna. “Technocracy, Democracy, and U.S. Climate
Politics: The Need for Demarcations” *Article published in
/Science, Technology, and Human Values/ Vol. 30, No. 1 (Winter
2005), pp. 137-169. Electronically available at:
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/resource-1892-2005.50.pdf
Ulrich Beck and other theorists of reflexive modernization are
allies in the general projectto reduce technocracy and elitism by
rendering decision making more democratic and robust. However,
this study of U.S. climate politics reveals complexities and
obstaclesto the sort of democratized decision making envisioned by
such theorists. Since theearly 1990s, the U.S. public has been
subjected to numerous media-driven campaigns toshape
understandings of this widely perceived threat. Political
interests have instigatedan important part of these campaigns,
frequently resorting to ethically problematic tacticsto undermine
attempts at policy action designed to avert or reduce the threat.
The disproportionate influence of such interests suggests the need
for a more level political playing field characterized by more
equalized access to power and influence.
*Lahsen, Myanna. “The Detection and Attribution of Conspiracies:
The Controversy Over Chapter 8”*
in George E. Marcus (ed.),/ Paranoia Within Reason: A Casebook on
Conspiracy as Explanation/, U. of Chicago Press, 1999. Available
at:
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/resource-1893-1999.21.pdf
-----------------------------------------
For those who are interested, this final article below shows the
existence of climate change skepticism in the mainstream
scientific community, a factor many analysts don't want to
recognize. It also shows climate modeling as a socio-cultural
process which also cannot be considered separate from its
political context, and why some scientists may be critical of some
of the tendencies in the mainstream science thatunderpins concern
about climate change.
*Lahsen, Myanna. “Seductive Simulations? Uncertainty Distribution
Around Climate Models”*
Article published in /Social Studies of Science/ 35 (December
2005), pp. 895-922. Electronically available at:
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/resource-1891-2005.49.pdf
This paper discusses the distribution of certainty around General
Circulation Models (GCMs) – computer models used to project
possible global climatic changes due to human emissions of
greenhouse gases. It calls for a multi-dimensional and dynamic
conceptualization of how uncertainty is distributed around this
technology. Processes and dynamics associated with GCM modeling
challenge the common assumption in science studies and beyond that
producers of a given technology and its products are the best
judges of their accuracy. Drawing on participant observation and
interviews with climate modelers and the atmospheric scientists
with whom they interact, the study analyzers the political
dimensions of how modelers talk and think about their models,
suggesting that modelers sometimes are less able than some users
to identify shortcomings of their models.
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