| Wednesday,
December 16, 2009
Beethoven's Birthday
Actually there are those who say December 17 is Beethoven's birthday,
but Lucy and Schroeder celebrate the 16th so we'll go with that.
Damage Control for Big Science
Big Science is stunned. People no longer have blind faith in Science --
which may mean that the whole grant system is in danger. The reach of
Climategate lengthens.
One of the opening moves in Big Science's countergame was in today's
Los Angeles Times:
"Climate change e-mail scandal underscores myth of pure science" by
Daniel Sarewitz and Samuel Thernstrom. It basically says that
science is fallible and full of politics -- surprise!" and concludes:
"Can science and politics recover from the
damage done in the name of scientific purity? We believe the weight of
scientific evidence remains sufficient to justify prudent action against
climate change -- but we are equally aware that the consequences of both
climate change and climate policies remain highly uncertain.
"The choices are extraordinarily difficult; the costs of action, and
inaction, are potentially momentous. No one can know what the "right"
decisions will be, but the e-mail controversy reminds us that imperfect
people, not pure science, must decide that question. This is a job for
democratic politics, informed by, but not shackled to, a pluralistic,
insightful and imperfect scientific enterprise."
In other words, it's really all right. Ignore ClimateGate
and get on with the Copenhagen Treaty. Preserve our grants, continue to pay
tribute to Al Gore, and yes, there's some doubt but it's OK to go on
spending trillions in "prudent action against climate change." I should note
that Samuel Thernstrom is an AEI Fellow and has written several worthwhile
articles on the subject: it's one reason I am amazed at this article.
My own views have not changed: of course science is not
unitary, of course there is politics including dirty tricks and outright
lying, faking data, character assassination, invocation of police and
military power to suppress opposition -- and none of that changes the rules,
which are that scientists when they are being scientists should welcome
opposition hypotheses, and must account for all the data, not just that
which favors their own positions. Of course most of the time scientists are
not acting like scientists. They are acting like advocates, or sometimes
like politicians. When they do, they should have no more credibility than
lawyers and politicians. I covered all this years ago in
The Voodoo Sciences.
Because scientists do not often act like scientists and
often act more like bureaucrats, it is important to set up
counter-bureaucracies when the subject matter is funded by public money
(controlled by a bureaucracy) and the outcome is important to public
spending. I am a supporter of the National Science Foundation, but I want it
reformed: I want 10% of its budget devoted to funding contrarian science
that challenges existing consensus. That should be done through
establishment of a funded bureaucracy dedicated to finding and funding such
challenges.
See
Samuel Thernstrom's reply to this in Mail
The Climate Trend
Today's LA Times has an article I can't find on line. The
title was "Copenhagen talks at crucial stage" and it was by a reporter named
Tankersley. The article isn't important, but it included a large chart of
the world temperature from 1880 to present, purporting to show the data from
all three climate record centers. Naturally they don't diverge much, and the
warming trend is obvious. Yep, there's Global Warming all right! No need to
worry about Climategate. Here's the data.
Closer examination shows that in 1880 the Earth's
temperature was 0.2 degrees C below some normal set to 0 -- I couldn't see
any absolute value for that -- and in 2000 it was about + 0.4, and in 2010
about + 0.5. This means -- assuming you believe in global temperature
accuracies to tenths of a degree -- that the Earth experienced a warming of
0.7 degree C over the last century. That's 9/5 x 0.7 = 1.3 degrees F. I
believe the NOAA contribution to that chart is here:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/
climate/research/anomalies/index.html .
The reference or 0 year seems to be the temperature from
about 1950 to 1970. I am sure there's a good reason for choosing that. The
chart also shows there's been more warming since 1950 than there was from
1880 to then.
You can believe as much of that as you want to. You can
believe that the last few years have been the warmest in human memory.
It's still only 1.3 degrees F over the past hundred years, but of course the
fright comes from that hockey stick spike from about 1980 to present. How
real is that spike? That, I would think, is the real matter for debate. But
do note that nowhere in these data is the 2 degree "extra" warming Arrhenius
thought would result from doubling CO2 in the atmosphere.
Meanwhile, it's cold out there in Wisconsin and Minnesota,
the area around the temperature sensor at the Santa Monica Airport has gone
from rural to urban heat island, and some people wonder a lot about the
accuracy of those numbers; and in Copenhagen everyone is demanding "climate
reparations" from the United States and Europe, and never mind the costs. Do
the data justify that? Are the "developing" nations worse off now because
the West thrived? No matter. It's time to pay reparations and take measures
to wreck the Western economies.
=====================
I was wandering through some of my
older files and found there are two different "reports" folders.
The main one has a very large
variety of reports, many of them still relevant, and if you have the
time a few minutes looking at what's available might be worth your while.
There is also an older reports
folder which leads to some photo-journalism reports, including
a walk through the hills above
Studio City, and two walks in Tokyo. There's other interesting stuff.
It's clear I need to spend some time organizing this mess. It's also clear I
won't be doing that for a while.
=====================
The President emptied out a Home Depot store in order to
make room for invited guests and his teleprompter. Interestingly enough, the
LA Daily News has an account of this, but today's LA Times has no mention of
it at all. I am not sure why; is the Times embarrassed? But the President
used the opportunity
to call insulation sexy, and exhort us all to caulk our windows,
insulate our attics, and save energy.
He told us that $8 billion of the $787 billion TARP funds
will go to stimulating such activities. I didn't catch on to how that will
work. According to the President, homes and offices consume ~ 40% of the US
energy budget, and our older homes are 50% less efficient than the new ones,
and this is an easy patch on out energy problems.
Perhaps so: but I'd be happier if he took $700 billion of
that TARP money, and gave half to the US Corps of Engineers and the other
half to the US Navy, and ordered them to build nuclear power plants. The
Navy gets the sea coastal cities. The Army gets the interior. Let them
compete to see who can produce the most power with the money they've been
allocated.
Energy plus freedom = jobs and economic recovery. Nuclear
energy adds no CO2 or other pollutants to the atmosphere.
=================
SUBJ: Today is more important than Beethoven's
birthday.
On this date, Dec 16th, 1773 "radicals" from
Marlborough, Massachusetts, threw 342 chests of tea from 3 British East
India Company ships into Boston Harbor in protest of oppressive taxation &
tyrannical rule.
While the composer is famous, remembrance of the
first Tea Party is _important_.
John
Unfortunately, the entire background of the Boston Tea
Party, including what was special about the American Revolution -- which was
based on demanding the rights of Free Englishmen as gained in the great Bill
of Rights following the Glorious Revolution -- is important, and very nearly
lost. I agree it's an important event but only if understood in its context.
I am hardly a fan of mob violence as an ordinary political action. Having
said that, I suspect that had I lived then, it would depend on my age as to
whether I would have dressed up in Indian costume and taken part in the
rebellion.
The Colonies wanted defense but didn't want to pay taxes for
it; and wanted expansion to the west, which made that defense necessary.
After Braddock's defeat in 1755 and subsequent French expansion, the British
gained control of most of the west in the Seven Year's War, known here as
the French and Indian War. With the removal of the French from much of the
continent the need for taxes and defense wasn't so clear to the Colonies.
Why should the Parliament at Westminster be supreme over Virginia and New
England?
Alas, we haven't time to continue this ramble. I agree it's
an important date. I just wish that our schools taught the history in which
it took place.
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