Summary: Here’s one of the best conversations I’ve seen about the state and process of climate science (not the technical details for professionals). If he were alive, Thomas Kuhn would smile at this evidence that his theory so well describes the workings of science — on which we rely for prosperity and perhaps survival. The public policy debate would become clearer if people paid more attention to these debates, rather than listening to the more entertaining but useless posturing of activists. {2nd of 2 posts today}
Eminent climate scientist Roger Pielke Sr published “NASA’s Dr. Gavin Schmidt goes into hiding from seven very inconvenient climate questions” at Watts Up With That. The discussion shifted over to the blog And Then There’s Physics (run by an anonymous scientist), where Chris Colose took a leading role (PhD student in an Atmospheric Science program at the U of Albany; bio at his website).
This twitter conversation among us nicely illustrates the state of climate science today: the debate about basic physics, the time-wasting personal invective, the confidence of those in the mainstream and their contempt for scientists on the fringes, and the blurred boundaries between scientists and amateurs and mountebanks.
All of these are common in the history of science, and well-described by Thomas Kuhn in his great classic The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
I’ve combined and lightly edited these tweets for clarity.
——————————
RogerAPielkeSr: Unfortunately, very true. They just want to play “gotcha” rather than work together to expand perspectives and approaches. “admitting an error is a poor strategy.” Says a lot about state of climate science. Admitting errors is how we learn. “I also don’t think that the term forcing in climate science is quite equivalent to a force in physics.” Wow.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): It was excellent discussion, IMO. Disagreement about basic physics gives a clear demo of the weak fundamentals of climate science. My background is in history of science. These debates are characteristic of science on the frontiers, not settled science.
Roger A. Pielke Sr: Except they are trying to force it as “settled science”.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): That’s standard operating procedure for science debates. Paradigms define settled science; crisis destroys consensus, hence their ferocity. See relativity, continental drift. A discussion that finds disagreement of such basic physics is IMO a success. is there any mechanism for follow-up? That’s a weakness of blogs.
Roger A. Pielke Sr: Effective yesterday; not so today. Let’s see if they take up other questions. I suspect they (and Gavin) will just ignore.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Agreed! That’s the weakness of informal internet discussions. Journal publications are more difficult to ignore.
Chris Colose: Your rhetorical tangents and intellectual laziness is why no one is taking this serious. Stop pretending to want a rational discussion. no one is buying it, and you aren’t owed anything. The state of “the science” is independent of whether two or three people make mistakes about describing it. It’s actually interesting that scientists with very successful careers (lots of pubs, etc) can be idiots in how they think about the world
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): As an observer, that seems too harsh. These kinds of disputes are common in science, difficult to resolve. Time!
Chris Colose: No one blogs demands director of some organization w lists of 7 questions they are too afraid to answer {as RogerAPielkeSr did}. Try sending Stephen Hawking “12 inconvenient questions about black holes,” see if “friendly debate” follows.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Don’t know Hawking, but some like aggressive challenges from fellow scientists. E.g., Carl Sagan (I knew him at Cornell). This reminds me of long ago debate in Scientific American: why does pumping boost child on swing set? Months of technical fierce debate before it was resolved.
Chris Colose: I think people need to learn what real sci debate looks like. cornering someone on FOX theater isn’t it.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Perhaps that’s too formal a view. Debates about evolution, relativity, continental drift fought in many kinds of forums.
Chris Colose: There’s understood protocol for forms of serious engagement, maybe not obvious to non-scientists.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): I am familiar w/ how these evolved over time. Formal mechanisms are a top layer interacting with other modes of debate.
Chris Colose: Sure, but most are theater, actual science progress doesn’t come from Nye and Ham arguing on TV.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Great point about Nye-Ham debate. Also, why do people listen to amateurs debate science? Most of these just spew chaff into public policy discussion of science. More broadly, IMO climate science well-described as Thomas Kuhn paradigm crisis (a somewhat rare event in science).
Chris Colose: Other issue is that audience rarely can evaluate nuances, rhetoric wins in these settings.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Agreed! Richard Dawkins’ debates with creationists are a definitive test. His defeat in these showed their futility.
Chris Colose: For these reasons, and others, most scientists prefer not to engage there and aren’t obligated to.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): I don’t believe that’s accurate. Climate science mainstream tends to ignore challenges to paradigm, a commonplace in history.
Chris Colose: What “challenges” do you think have been ignored, specifically?
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Look at “how ignored” to see “what is ignored”: as in the attempts to limit access to data, peer-reviewed journals & the IPCC. A common method to defend a paradigm.
Jones to Mann: 31 March and 4 July 2004
Chris Colose: If you want these things filled with third-rate nonsense, then sure.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Perhaps so, but past shows that refusal to debate is common in defense of disproven paradigms. It burns credibility.
Roger A. Pielke Sr: Mistakes are how science advances. :-) Hopefully you have learned to be more open from comment exchanges at ATTP.
Chris Colose: That’s not relevant. On a last note (work to do) you can tell a lot about someone how they interpret someone’s choice to not engage, e.g., with John Stossel (TV host) ranting about killing poor people in Gavin Schmidt’s ear. Time to walk away.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Agreed! But we’re discussing interaction among scientists, not with the mountebanks outside. Conflating them not helpful!
Chris Colose: What the internets calls “debate” has never been standard in history of science, only in your mind is climate science different in any regard.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Climate science is not different. There is a long history of debate via letter, meetings of Academies & at universities, etc. How does the new medium change it?
Chris Colose: The real issue is when people just don’t have a good case and expect everyone to pretend it remains interesting.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Common in history that paradigm defenders believe challengers “don’t have case.” Oft wrong, hence need for debate. You appear to believe can see correct side in paradigm conflicts. History suggests it’s obvious only in hindsight.
Chris Colose: I prefer a model with explanatory ability. not handwaving that one day it might be wrong. like gravity. It’s easy, submit a coherent result, done all the time. Creationists think the same way
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): That’s exactly as Kuhn describes: paradigms can’t be disproven, only replaced. An operationally powerful rule!
Chris Colose: Of course they can be disproven (in any useful sense of the word). but doubt for sake of doubt silly.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Debate between professionals becomes futile when focus shifts to legitimacy of participants. Vainly burning time and mindspace.
Chris Colose: Nobody is, I said if people have a good idea, try to publish it, not engage in circus acts.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): Characterizing intent of peers as “doubt for sake of doubt” and “circus acts” is imo just invective, questioning their legitimacy as scientists.
Chris Colose: Oh well., they should try harder then #dontprojectontome. That you pretend stuff as good as “moon made of blue cheese” is real debate is the problem, not the science. As a general rule, scientists very very interested in real criticism, but also have very good B.S. detectors. And if you can’t tell the diff, many scientists willing to explain. that =/= pretending everything is interesting.
Fabius Maximus (Ed.): That’s not remotely a rational description of the debate. Also, we have 2 centuries of history proving that scientists have no better “bs detectors” than anyone else (i.e., poor), but such excessive self-confidence is commonplace. As for characterizing the beliefs of scientists who disagree with you as “moon made of blue cheese” … Let’s end on nice note: Thanks to both for explaining these matters. I’m posting this. IMO more of these would help the public understand!
For More Information
To learn more about the state of climate change see The Rightful Place of Science: Disasters and Climate Change
If you liked this post, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. See these Reference Pages for other posts about climate on the FM sites: the keys to understanding climate change and my posts about climate change. Especially see these about the state of the debate:
- Have we prepared for normal climate change and non-extreme weather?
- Droughts are coming. Are we ready for the past to repeat?
- Weather & climate change: how to interpret our past in order to prepare for our future.
- Good news about our changing climate by Prof Daniel B. Botkin.
- More good news about the climate, giving us a priceless gift.
- Springtime in an Era of More Extreme Weather from the March 2015 Browning Newsletter.
- A frontier of climate science: the model-temperature divergence by Rud Istvan.
