"Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors."

-Jonas Salk

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Heartland: Economics is not Science

See the program for their next caucus. (They call it a conference, but it isn't that, is it?)

It's got a pretty horrifying cast of characters. Lindzen, Delingpole, De Freitas, Monckton, D'Aleo, etc. etc. all in the same place. But there is an interesting implicit concession that "science" and "economics" are distinct.

10 comments:

King of the Road said...

And that public policy is distinct from either. It's hard to disagree with this.

I'm not planning to attend but if I were I'd sure like to go to this session:

Session 9: Science
Moderated by Kristine Esposo
James Delingpole
Joe D'Aleo
Fred Singer

I've looked up Delingpole on Wikipedia and he describes himself as a "conservative libertarian." Interestingly, from a philosophical point of view, that's how I'd describe myself. Delingpole and I have little in common, however.

I'm unable to find anything in his biography that qualifies him to sit on a science panel. It seems like I'm more qualified, and I'm not qualified at all.

David B. Benson said...

Well, economics has been called the dismal science.

Take that in the second sense, please.

John Mashey said...

yes, that's a nice lsit to add to my compendiums of such things.

I notice Gerald Marsh has fully come out now. he had some interesting involvement with the APS FPS - Monckton fiasco in 2008.

David B. Benson said...

May seem odd to suggest

Tol, R.S.J. and A.F. de Vos (1998), ‘A Bayesian Statistical Analysis of the Enhanced Greenhouse Effect’, Climatic Change, 38, 87-112,

but the second author is an econometician and the paper states "This approach is inspired by the developments in econometrics where the failure of large models has led to the return to simplicity."

Anonymous said...

Well both economy and ecology derive from the same Greek word; oikos – the house. It seems to me that there has been little to no progress to go beyond our typical view (which drives many policies) that the world is our oyster, with a bounty of resources for the taking to a more sustainable give and take approach. It’s horrible when you hear of a pack like this getting together, who talk like hotel guests who find nothing wrong in swiping anything not nailed to the ground. King of the Road made a point about Delingpole being unqualified to discuss science; that certainly never stopped Monckton who is considered by many as their climate skeptic champion. Technically I have more qualifications than him regarding climate science and I know that I’m not qualified to be so loud on the subject.

Anonymous said...

Do Steve have a PH.D?

Unknown said...

Mr Tobis

It is Delingpole, not Dellingpole.

Michael Tobis said...

arajand, fixed, thanks.

Michael Tobis said...

So, Willard's cryptic observation amounts to pointing out that McIntyre has been promoted to a doctorate in the Heartland Caucus Schedule of Events.

Speaking of caucusing, I wonder if they ought to elect a denier-in-chief every year. That would add some drama to the event. Delegates could wear funny hats. There could be balloons.

Andrew Adams said...

King of the Road,

Yes, that got my attention as well. If you want to read Delingpole's views on AGW (and other subjects) you can do so here

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/author/jamesdelingpole/

although I really would advise it (and I certainly would warn you against reading the comments).

One thing is clear though - not only does he clearly not understand the science, he doesn't care about it - he 's just a professional contrarian who dismisses AGW because leftists and environmentalists believe in it.