NASA: "A Hopelessly Old-Fashioned View of the Future"

A current Bob Park's item which I will brazenly quote in its entirety.

In discussing NASA’s future on Tuesday, the NY Times was mesmerized by
the "gap" between the end of the shuttle and the launch of a new bus to
transport astronauts. Forget the damn gap. The 21st Century will be
focused on planets around other suns, and on the bad news about what’s
happening to our own planet. Astronauts can’t go to other stars, but we
can build better telescopes and get a better look at them. Astronauts
will be no help either in studying our own Sun and our own planet, Earth.
We need to finish what we set out to do a decade ago, but were stopped
from doing by the Bush administration: launch an updated Deep Space
Climate Observatory. There is still time, but we urgently need to get
started.

This is point 4 from the Jan 2 '09 edition which should be visible on Park's archive page soon. (I get the email version.)

See also, of course, the Triana/GoreSat/DSCOVR fiasco. Desmog has some new allegations about that story, by the way.

 

Snippets from the Pseudo-Debate

In looking through all 203 responses to Tierney's anti-Holdren screed to date I came up with some interesting nuggets. Alas, the idea that "global warming" is some sort of conspiracy is not going away. Witness, then,  a grab bag of comments from John Tierney's recent anti-Holdren screed in the NYTimes blogs that I think are sadly representative:

#73, Steven Walser:

none of us KNOWS what the correct response is, should be publicized far more widely.
We must all realize that ALL theories of climate change are just that THEORIES, not FACTS.
The proposed nostrums have very real world consequences. We simply do not have adequate knowledge to be implementing “solutions” that may, in fact, turn out to have unintended consequences far graver than the problems they seek to solve.
The questions of climate science far exceed in complexity the questions in economics which is wholly of human design and creation and yet as we currently see the effects of our common lack of understanding of human nature play out in the economic world many here call for putting more power into the hands of these same, very fallible humans, to craft a future over which they have even less understanding.

You hear this nonsense spun over and over again. It's so confused it's hard to refute but somebody ought to give it a try.

Simply because we don't know exactly what would be best to do is no excuse for doing nothing. We always must act on best available information. Doing nothing (construed as making no changes in extant policies regarding energy) is not even possible in any case, as should be plain to anyone who thinks about it. Something will be done, and the question is what that will be. So this boils down to an argument to discount evidence that the writer finds, well, inconvenient. Yet the writer has no concept that this is the case.

It is interesting that the assertion is made that "The questions of climate science far exceed in complexity the questions in economics". The comparison between the two fields is, I think, both fruitful and thanks to the political power of economists, inevitable. 

I find the above-quoted writer's position nonsensical. Economics, being essentially a branch of psychology, is vastly more complex than climatology; the scale separations and level of detail that make climatology complex compared to other domains of essentially classical 19th century physics are very favorable in comparison to behavioral sciences. If a robust theory of applied economics is possible, the available data is so vastly inadequate to test it that it is hard to see how a correct theory might emerge. Meanwhile, the set of observational and theoretical constraints on the physical atmosphere and oceans are precise and well understood. 

It's really interesting how and why Mr. Walser gets this backwards.

#80 has this old saw:

Can Holdren prove his point? Nope. The only “proof” he has are climate MODELS. That’s not empirical science.

Um, well, what do we mean by MODELS here? This is fodder for a very long discussion; I've seen a couple of stabs at it. I don't actually know how one predicts the future empirically, of course. This also boils down to an argument for celebrating ignorance.

#84 comes right out and gets it very wrong in very few words:

Has Holdren caught on to the fact that CO2 doesn’t cause an increase in temperatures yet?

Heh. What can you say to that? "Does too!" 

It might be wise to avoid that trap and move onto "That's not what I understand. What makes you say that?"

#101 has this remarkable claim:

I think the AGW people are fearful that the earth is cooling. Which means that they have to enact their economic control laws quickly in order to take credit for the cooling.

I don't see how that would be possible; there is little likelihood that the CO2 concentration will be stabilizing, never mind declining, any time soon. The author seems to be unaware that the claims being made are quantitative or what their nature might possibly be. Nevertheless he feels confident in refuting the claims, whether he knows what they are or not.

#114, by Donald Kingsbury, is far more reasonable at first blush:

Holdren is acting as a defense attorney for a complicated mathematical model of climate — which is far more complicated than the current mathematical models of our economy, which have just been proven, by circumstance, to be drastically inadequate.

As a mathematician I can assure you that current climate models — either those “proving” that humans are having a lethally bad effect on climate or those “proving” that the changes are within the normal bounds of the last million years — are not adequate. Obama needs another adviser, a prosecutor who can look at what Holdren refuses to look at, ie those aspects that might be wrong with current theory. That is the way SCIENCE is done.

Kingsbury is only correct in principle. He seems unaware that the trial has already been conducted, many times. Here is the root of our problem. We have to get on to the sentencing, but the sort of noise Tierney is propagating here cause the trial to be repeated endlessly. Is it malfeasance on Kingsbury's part top be wrong about this? Presumably not, he seems a thoughtful enough fellow. Is it malfeasance on Tierney's. Yes indeed. A journalist has the responsibility not to be egregiously wrong. If he is ill-equipped for the task at hand, he should cede the territory to someone who is able to address it correctly.

Which brings us neatly to the claim of Lysenkoism in #62:

Now, I can be wrong but I do see some uncomfortable parallels between Lysenkoism and climate-change alarmists.
In both cases skepticism is not tolerated ( the science is “settled”) and skeptics run the risk of losing their jobs. On top of that, prominent alarmists like James Hansen en David Suzuki want “climate criminals” on trial.

First of all, if willfully lying about matters of this consequence is not criminal, it seems to be a severe oversight in the law. Proving intent will be nearly impossible, but if anyone intentionally lies in either overstating or understating the case here, it's not hard to argue that they are liable.

Let's cpnsider, though, the claim that alternative positions are squelched that is the issue.

People like Joe Romm who go ballistic about articles like this Tierney's are not without justification (though I suspect the display of the anger may be counterproductive we can argue about it). It's easy, on the other hand, to misconstrue this sort of anger as an infringement on free speech by political correctness. Whether it is the one or isn't independent of the substantive evidence, though! The question depends sensitively on how strongly the evidence points in one direction or another. Are reasonable opinions being suppressed? Or are unreasonable opinions being appropriately ignored?

In the present case, the evidence that human impact on the climate system is detectable, growing, and hard to alter on a suitable time scale, is overwhelming. (Whether that time scale is 10 years or 100 is another matter, but the number of arguably informed people who think it's outside that window is very small.)

Unfortunately, the number of people who can evaluate the evidence directly is relatively small compared to the entire world population, though it is not insignificant; probably numbering on the order of 100,000 people; or one person out of every 50,000 in the general population. The rest of us have to operate on networks of trust, and these networks are sufficiently frayed and tarnished that some people find themselves hooking up with the likes of Tierney or Lomborg, themselves inaccessible to the people who really understand what is going on.

It is the task of the general public to evaluate exactly whom the experts are, to weigh the plausibility of the proposed conspiracy against the plausibility of the problem, and to support appropriate action. Significant sections of the public in some countries are failing at this task. It is the task of journalists to provide the public with a fair representation of the balance of evidence. Part of the failure of the public is attributable to a failure by journalists.

Speech must remain free in a free society, of course, but it does the free society no good to indulge in speech that is irresponsible. As long as Tierney is carrying the imprimatur of the New York Times, people will continue to take this stuff seriously. Journalism should endeavor to close debates as well as open them. It's a matter of the merits of the debate.

Peer review does help, of course. When an opinion has currency in the press and not in the journals, one thing the press might do is call attention to the two alternative explanations of why that is. Suppression of valid opinion is one possibility, but a lack of coherence with scientific evidence is another. Science is an imperfect enterprise, to be sure, but an opinion on scientific matters that is not represented within science should typically not garner attention from the press.

The thing about science is that eventually things are decided. It seems the journalistic sector has either lost track of this fact or is afraid to convey it to the public.

Update: Here's a gem from comments to a pretty trivial Newsweek article

When will you and other publications realize that CO2 is a trace gas and has little to do with temperature variations? Temps vary in cycles of approximately 30 years, and have been dropping for about 5 years now, but those like you are hopelessly blind to real science. Global warming has become a tenet of the eco-religious who think a butterfly is more valuable than a baby. Research and report the truth or you will eventually lose what little credibility you have left.

In other words, not only does he know more than you do, but he threatens to ignore you if you don't come around to my (unsupportable) point of view. Indeed, this is what the press is afraid of, the more so now that their business model is in trouble. 

Update: It looks like the bad guys are trying to give the Bill-Ayres treatment to Holdren and thus anyone associted with him. It's a very silly effort because, unlike the attack on Ayres, it sorely lacks for ammunition.

The denialists do not want, themselves, to be the topic of conversation and are trying very hard to punish anyone who brings the topic of who they are and  how they got that way to center stage. Holdren has taken them on directly and this is an attempt at revenge.

It's also another opportunity for the press to take on the real issues. I am not betting they will.

Another Sign of Dawning Realization

Dot Earth is running "Eleven Questions for Obama's Science Team" and I would like to especially recommend they (and all of us) think long and hard on question eight, which is a nice statement of one of our themes here:

My request to the Obama transition team is to introduce the economy team to the science team. Economists like Daniel Tarullo would benefit from discussing the laws of thermodynamics with Steven Chu. I’m also sure that the science community would benefit from learning something of the complexity of economics theory and practice. New ideas might evolve!

I’m certain that physics has laws that must be obeyed at our peril, but I’m not convinced that economics has shown their ‘laws’ to be inviolate. In fact, just now to the contrary those principles are looking quite tarnished. And, I’d like to see a science-cum-economics dialogue continue and evolve throughout Obama’s tenure in the White House. It would greatly benefit our transition to a sustainable economy based on alternative energy, resource conservation, green jobs and creative partipation by all sectors of our society.

Thanks to the questioner, Wayne Hamilton of Springdale, Utah.

 

Post-Growth America

A surprising glimmer of recognition spotted in the major media:

"Look," said the President, walking across the stage with a microphone in hand, "here's what no one wants to tell you. Structural changes in our economy, and new competition from countries like China and India, mean that we're in a different world now. That pattern we once took for granted, in which our incomes basically kept rising across the board, turns out to be something we can't sustain. Many of you are earning less than your parents did, and the truth is, many of your children will earn less than you do."

The President paused, watching as the words sank in. "I don't think denial helps any of us. I know it won't help us come together to do the things we need to do as a nation to thrive even amid these new realities."

Don't worry, you didn't miss the news; the scene above has not happened yet. Few politicians would say those things even if they believed them to be true, because it would challenge a notion at the heart of the American dream: the idea that the kids will earn more than we do.

...

There's a third worrisome attitude traceable to our faith that the kids will earn more than we do. This is the imprudent conviction that we can live beyond our means, because somehow we'll earn enough later to deal with any problems. This outlook represents a dramatic shift from earlier American thinking, as the sociologist Daniel Bell noted in 1976. "Twentieth-century capitalism wrought a ... startling sociological transformation," he wrote, "the shift from production to consumption as the fulcrum of capitalism." Both as individuals and as a society, we've been gambling on better days tomorrow to make good on unsustainable borrowing today.

Such is the toll of a Dead Idea.

This is from Matt Miller, editor at Fortune, raised in Greenwich CT and Rye Town NY, BA economics magna cum laude Brown, LLD Columbia Law School, member Council on Foreign Relations. In other words, to the extent that there's still an "Establishment", he's in it. You heard it there second.

 

Academia and New Media

Bora Z tweets about a fascinating blog about new forms in academia called Academic Evolution.

Tierney vs Holdren

NYTimes science reporter John Tierney goes after Obama appointee John Holdren, about whom I have written admiringly of late, with both guns a-blazin'.

Along the way he expresses concern for how Lomborg gets treated in certain circles and has a kind word to throw in for Roger Jr.. It's sticky stuff, not as easily dismissed as the usual denialist tripe, as I have argued before. This stuff is badly wrong, but it needs to be handled with care.

Update: Three guesses what Joe Romm thinks.

Obama on Science

More grownup talk:

Whether it’s the science to slow global warming; the technology to protect our troops and confront bioterror and weapons of mass destruction; the research to find life-saving cures; or the innovations to remake our industries and create twenty-first century jobs—today, more than ever before, science holds the key to our survival as a planet and our security and prosperity as a nation. It is time we once again put science at the top of our agenda and worked to restore America’s place as the world leader in science and technology.

...

Because the truth is that promoting science isn’t just about providing resources—it’s about protecting free and open inquiry. It’s about ensuring that facts and evidence are never twisted or obscured by politics or ideology. It’s about listening to what our scientists have to say, even when it’s inconvenient—especially when it’s inconvenient. Because the highest purpose of science is the search for knowledge, truth and a greater understanding of the world around us

Like my friend J says, he better not f'ing blow it. Don't you want to hear Palin's take on this issue?

Grownups in Town

It's so very nice to see grownups in the executive branch; any hope that the legislative will follow suit?

The choices of Holdren and Chu show every likelihood that the incoming administration wants to put the carbon problem on the front burner. This is great news!

But they have so much else to do what with the "economy" of the US and to some extent of the whole world being shown to be based on utter lunacy over the last twenty years. Oh and that little thing about the two bollixed wars... OK, I'm not saying anything you haven't heard...

The referenced Dot Earth article doesn't dwell so much on John Holdren, whom we discussed here recently. Rather it branches sort of peculiarly into a very good discussion with Gary Yohe, from Yale's e360 site.

Anyway I am glad this way of thinking has finally made its way into the Times:

Uncertainly is ubiquitous. There are some fundamental conclusions that we now know: that the planet is warming; that humans are the cause of it. We’ve seen the climate signal and changes in global mean temperature… But there’s some uncertainty that simply will not be resolved in a timely fashion. Yet once you adopt a risk-management perspective, then uncertainty becomes a reason to do something rather than a reason not to do something. And people who argue against doing anything then have to guarantee that humans aren’t changing the climate. They can’t do that, so they can’t argue against enacting some climate policy. At the same time, though, uncertainty is something we need to recognize will be persistent. We have to learn how to make decisions under uncertainty.

...

So the point is that climate policy has to adopt a risk-management approach. It involves both adaptation and mitigation. We have to think seriously about how we do mid-course corrections. What is near-term policy? How do you make adjustments? Well, you keep track of how you’re doing relative to the short-term target that you set up. But you also have to worry about whether or not the target was right, and that’s where increased knowledge about the climate system and the economic system come into play. And so every 10 years or so, you have to sit down and say, “Okay what have we learned? Are we doing well compared to the target we set? Is the target right? Is it too high? Is it too low? Should we ramp these things up or ramp these things down?” And those are the essential things that we need to do.

Maybe this kind of sense will somehow find its way into the congress. Paging Sen. Inhofe?

The Financial WTF in Context

Walden Bello has put together a fascinating presentation putting the financial crisis in context.

It's more leftist in tone than I'd like, and I'm not sure it adequately understands the irrationality of growth addiction, which really is shared by left and right.

Also a couple of the slides are misformatted.

All that said, it does focus on the key role of manufacturing overproduction and excess capacity in the present financial disaster. I think it's a very helpful and insightful summary and I am definitely adding it to my conceptual arsenal. Maybe you should do likewise?

I stole the wonderful image from the presentation. It's based on what for all I know is, or at least once was, a heavily advertised bubble bath product called Mr. Bubble.

The Singularity

Unlike a certain breed of AI enthusiasts, when I contemplate the possibility that we are at a singular point in human history, that we may be at a point where past conventional wisdom needs to be actively disregarded, I don't see it as a moment of new kinds of progress but one of new kinds of peril.

Basically, we are going through a phase transition, between a state where there were few monkeys to one where there are many monkeys. This means the former time where issues are distinct and perhaps have tenuous connections is over; now there is one big tangled problem: how do we keep the monkeys happy while settling them down and training them to live in a more or less zero-sum situation.

Maribo (H/T Stoat) offers us this daunting image to bring home one slice of the problem:

and a recent article in the online Journal PlosOne goes further.

In Ecosystem Overfishing in the Ocean by the Spanish, Canadian and Italian collaboration of Marta Coll, Simone Libralato, Sergi Tudela, Isabel Palomera, and Fabio Pranovi, the overfishing problem is viewed as a bulk biogeochemical process.

Here's the abstract:

Fisheries catches represent a net export of mass and energy that can no longer be used by trophic levels higher than those fished. Thus, exploitation implies a depletion of secondary production of higher trophic levels (here the production of mass and energy by herbivores and carnivores in the ecosystem) due to the removal of prey. The depletion of secondary production due to the export of biomass and energy through catches was recently formulated as a proxy for evaluating the ecosystem impacts of fishing–i.e., the level of ecosystem overfishing. Here we evaluate the historical and current risk of ecosystem overfishing at a global scale by quantifying the depletion of secondary production using the best available fisheries and ecological data (i.e., catch and primary production). Our results highlight an increasing trend in the number of unsustainable fisheries (i.e., an increase in the risk of ecosystem overfishing) from the 1950s to the 2000s, and illustrate the worldwide geographic expansion of overfishing. These results enable to assess when and where fishing became unsustainable at the ecosystem level. At present, total catch per capita from Large Marine Ecosystems is at least twice the value estimated to ensure fishing at moderate sustainable levels.

In other words:

Fisheries catches represent a net export of mass and energy that can no longer be used by trophic levels higher than those fished. Thus, exploitation implies a depletion of secondary production of higher trophic levels due to the removal of prey. Based on this assumption, a new method was developed to quantify the loss in secondary production (L index) due to the removal of marine organisms through catches (expressed as PPR equivalents) compared to a theoretical unfished situation...

Humans aren't just overfishing species, we are exporting biomass, degrading it, and pooping it back out into estuaries to first order. We are clear-cutting the whole ocean.

Again, the incentives for individual ship owners to behave this way are clear enough. The question is how to remove those incentives when the catch becomes too large, which it clearly is. I don't know; cap and trade is hard enough to enforce on nations, never mind on boats. And maybe, since we're going to acidify the oceans beyond supporting advanced life anyway, it could be argued that we might as well go ahead and send boats to pick out all the nice sushi first.

The sorts of decisions that have to be made to preserve the entire ocean are without precedent. It is a good thing that scientists go out and try to keep us informed as to what is happening. It would be better if there were some way to reward people for coming up with ways to change our collective behavior.

Update: Here's some perverse incentives for you, in a video clip sent by "tidal".