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Ger at 15:48 PM on 28 July 2017Trump pulled out the oil industry playbook and players for Paris
Is there still the same (oil & gas) economy when Earth was 0.5 C cooler? Costs have rissen, quality of gas,oil & coal has fallen, operating conditions detoriated --> energy price went up. Will we accept the same economy when Earth is 1.5 C hotter, with prices close or above the values in 2008? Don't think so. Prices collapsed and now we buy (much worser quality, higher processing cost) oil for about half the price.
Any use of some old scenario pulled out of a hat ain't gonna work. The state of the economy has changed with the temperature in a not so simple way.
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Lachlan at 15:42 PM on 28 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #29
The third graph (monthly anomalies) in the lead story looks wrong.
The graph claims to show the excess over the mean for the period 1980-2010, but only one point is reported as being below that mean. The mean appears to be offset by about 0.4 degrees.
Was a different baseline used? This graph exagerates warming, giving fuel to those calling scientists "alarmists". Could an expert please fix it?
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Wol at 14:23 PM on 28 July 2017Trump pulled out the oil industry playbook and players for Paris
I think it's important to separate the science from the economic argument.
A (poor, admittedly) simily might be the police service of a nation: it almost certainly costs more in pure economic terms to maintain one than it "saves" in money and all the costs of crime. But few would argue that means there should be no police service: it's not an economic plus or minus equation.
It's a valid point of view to accept the science of AGW and to say "I don't give a **** " but I don't think it's valid to argue that whether or not the cost of containing temperatures is a plus or minus on carrying on as usual, given the probable effects in the long term, is worth it.
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nigelj at 06:48 AM on 28 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Jgnfld @92
Yes interesting comments.
My understanding is eugenics is essentially controlled breeding. It is a very bad example of scientific consensus for another reason, as controlled breeding is more of a technology, or applied science, with all sorts of political and ethical overtures. Even if biologists were in general agreement on the scientific principles, there's no evidence they supported the practice.
I agree eugenics would work to some extent in theory, in that some traits can be encouraged. Eugenics happens anyway in an informal, voluntary sense. Intelligent people (with degree based educations) are tending to marry more these days, and so presumably this leads to slightly more intelligent offspring, which is not a bad outcome. It does however raise questions about potential downsides, like increasing economic inequality.
I guess that it's a question of whether society consciously does this sort of thing in some sort of planned way. That becomes much more challenging and dubious idea. Its not like breeding plants for bigger, brighter flowers. Humans are far more complicated.
For example if you had blue eyes, do you seek out a partner with blue eyes hoping to increase the odds of blue eyed children? It becomes slightly dubious, and who is to say what is preferable anyway or that a blue eyed population makes any kind of sense. We might find blue eyes have some hidden negative feature.
It's slightly clearer with intelligence. And its slightly clearer with genes associated with inherited diseases. But I'm comfortable with people and couples having good information on that, and making their own minds up in a voluntary sense.
I disagree with ideas like forced sterilisation or any coercion, or state planning / encouragement.
And do you you seek out passive, non agressive people to breed together? We arent 100% sure what behavioural traits are inherited, or whether a totally passive population is desirable (although I would prefer a bit less agression in the world). We just dont know enough to know what we would be doing.
Regarding criminal traits, Australia was founded as a penal colony. It's a country of immigrant criminals, but actually now has quite low rates of crime. So criminal behaviour may be mostly determined by environment and childhood rather than some inherited factor, or maybe its caused by a complex mixture of both.
Even if we encouraged some form of selective breeding, we just dont know enough. And imagine trying to sort out so many different attributes.
Forcing the issue on people is just plain creepy. I think there is more future in gene therapy with crisper technologies that can target attributes that cause disease. This could eventually extend to behavioural attributes, but that is likely a fair way in the furure and right now we just dont know enough.
Agree about Erlich. It was never a scientific consensus, but the climate denialists deliberately muddy the waters.
The denialists pick on that book "Limits to Growth" on resource scarcity as another example of so called failed consensus, but it was only the view of a few people. It was also only a modelling exercise based on known knowledge about resources at the time, and openly admitted reserves were likely larger.
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jgnfld at 20:24 PM on 27 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Eugenics is often brought up by deniers as we see here as an error in "consensus". I disagree. It was much more an error of extrapolation based heavily on fears. First, there is a grain of truth in eugenics: I have no doubt that we could breed, oh, women who produce more milk and a subgroup of men who produce sperm that leads to more women who will have high milk production just as farmers have done with dairy cattle. But extrapolating to "feeble-mindedness" never had solid scientific support no matter how politically attractive the notion was. Fears of havng defective babies are prettty deep and common in all of us, after all.
In climate science, it would correspond to if the ultra-greens were able to pass some extreme legislation based on an error in extrapolating climate research. For example, let's say the worst case scenarios we have recently seen in the NY Times gained high public traction. It is easily possible to imagine the public to pressure politicians to pass legislation that "seems" sensible but has only minimal scientific support. Or, as actually happened, recall the great oil embargo fears of the 70s. Corn-based ethanol for cars is indeed a good example of fear-based legislation with only minimal scientific support and "consensus".
Eugenics was heavily influenced by a rather "alarmist" economic notion that bad genes caused a great economic drain on society. A 1911 Scientific American editorial put it thus:
ADA JUKE is known to anthropologists as the "mother of criminals." From her there were directly descended one thousand two hundred persons. Of these, one thousand were criminals, paupers, inebriates, insane, or on the streets. That heritage of crime, disease, inefficiency and immorality cost the State of New York about a million and a quarter dollars for maintenance directly. What the indirect loss was in property stolen, in injury to life and limb, no one can estimate."
Suppose that Ada Juke or her immediate children had been prevented from perpetuating the Juke family. Not only would the State have been spared the necessity of supporting one thousand defective persons, morally and physically incapable of performing the functions of citizenship, but American manhood would have been considerably better off, and society would have been free from one taint at least."
Note the argument about "destroying the economy" and consider who most invokes this argument today.
Immigration fears, particularly fear of immigrants from Catholic and Slavic areas, also influenced the prevailing thinking as much or more as it was influenced by science. Race, of course, entered in too.
It is important also to note that eugenics was always shunned by central figures in genetics like Morton and Bateson in the US and others elsewhere.
Eugenics makes a bad example of showing the supposed problem of scientific consensus on climate. It simply misses as a good analogy in very many ways. It makes a very good example of showing how widespread fears can be allied with minimal science to make bad politics. The confluence of widely felt fears that eugenics tapped was wide and deep and that political action ensued is understandable if not rational. Surrendering to fears really is a problem as this blog entry shows.
Another scientific debate brought up by denier types as an example of the "dangers of consensus" is the population bomb proposed by Erhlich. In this case, while Erhlich attained much public support, as did the eugenicists, it had even less support from basic researchers than did eugenics. And as an analogy it fails even more deeply.
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bozzza at 13:08 PM on 27 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
The panic has set in (as readily observed by increasing market demand being met by increasing market supply): the truth is that a journey of a thousand miles doesn't begin with the first step because we are already on the path. We are already on the journey.
"Where am/are I/we going again?", becomes the individual/collective question as it always has been.
Who am/are I/we?
The game is always being played... we are on the journey as we speak.
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nigelj at 06:50 AM on 27 July 2017Trump pulled out the oil industry playbook and players for Paris
Everything you say is true. It all makes me frustrated and annoyed, like an irritating mosquito buzzing around.
We have a group of individuals in denial about climate change for a variety of reasons, because it challenges their vested interests, and ideological world views. They link up with like minded lobby groups like the Heartland Institute, with nice warm fuzzy names, but extreme and very dubious political agendas underneath. The whole thing is like a network with a language all its own.
They hire any expert they can find who might share their ideology, or will do anything for money no matter how unethical it is. These people corrode the public good.
We have enough books, websites and articles documenting aspects of all this, like "Merchants of Doubt" and De Smog Blog etc
You have politicians in denial about climate change , particularly in America. They are ignorant and cowardly, and scared to do anything that might annoy the public, so are desperate for soothing messages from economists saying climate change is not an issue.
Ignore these characters with their misleading reports. Look at places like California, British Columbia and Great Britain that have taken some significant steps to combat climate change. It hasn't hurt their economies in the slightest.
Real world evidence always trumps claims by second rate economists hired by oil companies , or so called "think tanks" (that would be an oxymoron).
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chriskoz at 21:47 PM on 26 July 2017What’s your carbon footprint and where does it come from?
Latest study (press release) on the subject:
The most effective individual steps to tackle climate change
confirms the 4 main ingredients of mitigation at individual level: "eating a plant-based diet, avoiding air travel, living car-free, and having smaller families".
Maybe individual mitigation does not have as big impact in my country with emission breakedown I showed @18, but still it's the easiest thing to do by everyone and by far.
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scaddenp at 21:02 PM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
"Thirdly, Humlum argues that OHC is a better measure of global temperature which all would agree is true"
I am guessing Humlum support for OHC was at same time as Peikle was pumping it, believing it would show less warming. Wonder if he still as enthusiastic? Peikle went very quiet about it. OHC is a good measure of energy imbalance - and the data set is considerably less noisy than surface temperature. However, the surface temperature for all of its noise and measuring issues is about where we actually live.
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scaddenp at 20:46 PM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
"but the data revisions - especially those before the satellite record - would seem to create some uncertainty around the long term rate of the warming."
I dont get the logic here. Does cleaning the lenses on your camera increase the noise in the image? The "revisions" are results of in depth, peer reviewed methodologies to put station records onto a common basis which reduces the uncertainty, not increases it.
I find your faith in the satellite data unwarrented too. See this myth for which has the greater uncertainty. Let me ask this, how much of Humlum stuff do we need to debunk for you before you write it off as misleading (to be polite)? 10, 20? or will you keep looking through that and other pseudo-skeptic sources in hope of finding better news?
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MA Rodger at 19:42 PM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Mike Evershed @427.
For anyone who takes the time to examine Humlum's work, it is evident the man is a prolific source of nonsense and that he does not take any rebuttal seriously because he doesn't care. Note his Figure 3 on the web-page providing your primary quote - it is addressed in this SkS rebuttal here but in response Figure 3 has not been properly corrected by Humlum. Rather, now we find his Figure 3 is simply "not showing the post Little Ice Age temperature increase."
The logic of the Humlum quote you present @422 is making three assertions. Firstly that it is difficult to create "a meaningful global average temperature" and while the word "meaningful" is a bit odd, it is correct to say that it is not a trivial task to create a global surface temperature record. But, as shown in the links @423Response, this work has been done.
Secondly, Humlum references Essex et al (2006). Yet Humlum does not set out in any way what it is in this paper he is referring to. He says it is "an interesting discussion of the whole concept of calculating an average global temperature" and that "a re-read of Essex et al. 2006 might be worthwhile." The reference by Humlum is thus nonsense.
Thirdly, Humlum argues that OHC is a better measure of global temperature which all would agree is true.
So, stripped of its nonsense, Humlum's quote is not supporting your suggestion that there is "some uncertainty around the long term rate of the warming," that is uncertainty beyond that declared within the work that created them.
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Mike Evershed at 18:33 PM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Thanks for the measured response Rob. My question was a serious one - my reading of Humlums data on this narrow point is not that there is any doubt about the fact of warming, but the data revisions - especially those before the satellite record - would seem to create some uncertainty around the long term rate of the warming.
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Ger at 14:12 PM on 26 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
3rd sentence first paragraph: a better COKE from the coal than from the charcoal..
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Ger at 14:07 PM on 26 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
A good starting point would be the time when fossil fuel usage surpassed the use of charcoal/firewood. First commercial mining of coal started back in 1680 (England), 1740 (USA) but the use of coal became significant after we could produce a better from the coal than charcoal (around 1850). I would pick that point as the start time: we put more long stored carbon into the air than from the short storage period.
Best option to me would be creating a second -closed loop- carbon cycle, capturing all carbon dioxide from power production. No need for sequestering on a large scale if at the same time we use all available solar/wind power produced in excess to convert CO2 back to methane (Power to gas) and inject the gas into existing pipelines/resevoirs until needed. Solar power received is large enough to convert a 10,000 time over all energy need so even a 2% coverage of all land mass (roof tops/desserts/forest/water bodies) with 0.5% efficient overall technology would give about 2 to 3 times the amount of energy we use today. The larger part of that excess can be used to remove CO2 from the natural loop and inject into the new technical loop.
If carbon capture can be done for a $45/ton ( $135/MWh produced) than, on top of the production price of $70/MWh, reducing distribution costs by local distributed generation (tie lines with capacity of 10% of total volume) to a $30/MWh, we are looking at a power price $235/MWh or US$ 0.235/kWh at the moment.
Currently the price I pay (non-industrial use) is a 16 cents/kWh (Philippines, Manila area) but know of enough areas here where the actual price is 22 cents, areas in Cambodia where the price is 1700 Riels (consumer, 40 cents) to 2000 Riels (industrial, 45 cents). Imagine a good distributed power to gas generating system in such sunshine countries with constant 'natural' carbon capture storing natural carbon in a separte second loop.
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Rob Honeycutt at 11:18 AM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Mike... It should be noted that most of the regulars here are very familiar with Humlum's work. He really isn't credible. On this topic in particular he's presenting a rather absurd notion. Yes, all the various data sets show different figures, but they only vary in a minimal way, and the differences between them certainly don't invalidate them in any way.
To the question, "Is global mean temperature rising?" there can be no doubt. All the data sets say yes. We get that from all the surface station data and from all the satellite data. The variances between them are merely a function of how each group processes their data.
It's interesting that Humlum states that ocean data is the better indicator, and he's right. And when you look at ocean heat content you get the exact same answer. The climate system is accumulating heat.
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Bob Loblaw at 10:51 AM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Er, MIke, not Mark. Sorry.
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Bob Loblaw at 10:50 AM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Mark:
The point is that Humlum has no credibility as a witness.
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Mike Evershed at 05:11 AM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Hi DB: I apologise for not adding the final extension to the link. However now you have added the correct link, other users can see Humlums extensive analysis of administrative changes in all the major data series. This hardly constitutes a straw man. And how does making a generic attack on "Humlum's nonsense" contribute to this debate? I have cited his extensive charts on instability in the reconstructed temperature data and you respond with two completely unrelated points made on other data presented by humlum. Do your sites standards on "ad-hominem" and provision of proof apply to moderators? If not I'm probably wasting my time.
Moderator Response:[TD] Tom Curtis's comment is educational. Also Zeke's post.
[JH] Moderation complaint snipped.
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Daniel Bailey at 02:43 AM on 26 July 2017It's methane
The 'Solomon' paper you obliquely reference is found here:
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Daniel Bailey at 02:35 AM on 26 July 2017It's methane
Let's look at atmospheric methane levels, shall we?
First, we see that overall levels of atmospheric methane are indeed rising:
We can also look at the global methane budget:
We can even look at atmospheric levels of methane by latitude band:
From the available evidence, we see that the primary sources of the recent rise are from the tropics and mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, with some further contributions from animal agriculture and fugitive emissions from industry.
Doubtless further research will elucidate better quantifications.
Your contributions from Zickfeld et al (not Solomon) are noted. But the sheer size of the bolus emissions from CO2 have multi-millennial consequences, too:
Per Zhang and Caldeira 2015, when you burn a lump of coal or some gas, the greenhouse effect from the resulting CO2 will over time warm the Earth 100,000 times more than the heat released upon combustion.
(1 min video on their new study comparing CO2 and direct thermal warming from fossil fuels)
At the end of The Long Thaw, David Archer calculates that the amount of energy that is trapped by the CO2 produced by burning gasoline today is, over its atmospheric lifetime, 40 million times the amount of fuel energy released today.
"The lifetime of fossil fuel CO2 in the atmosphere is a few centuries, plus 25 percent that lasts essentially forever. The next time you fill your tank, reflect upon this. The climatic impacts of releasing fossil fuel CO2 to the atmosphere will last longer than Stonehenge," Archer writes. "Longer than time capsules, longer than nuclear waste, far longer than the age of human civilization so far."
"The effects of carbon dioxide on the atmosphere drop off so slowly that unless we kick our "fossil fuel addiction", to use George W. Bush's phrase, we could force Earth out of its regular pattern of freezes and thaws that has lasted for more than a million years."
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Mike Evershed at 01:30 AM on 26 July 2017Temp record is unreliable
Moving on to a more sensible discussion. Surely the instability in the reconstructed temperature record is a legitimate cause for concern? Ole Homlums has published a lot of data on the adjustments and seems to come to the reasonable conclusion that:
"Based on the above [detailed charts of changes over time ] it is not possible to conclude which of the above five databases represents the best estimate on global temperature variations. The answer to this question remains elusive. All five databases are the result of much painstaking work, and they all represent admirable attempts towards establishing an estimate of recent global temperature changes. At the same time it should however be noted, that a temperature record which keeps on changing the past hardly can qualify as being correct. With this in mind, it is interesting that none of the global temperature records shown above are characterised by high temporal stability. Presumably this illustrates how difficult it is to calculate a meaningful global average temperature. A re-read of Essex et al. 2006 might be worthwhile. In addition to this, surface air temperature remains a poor indicator of global climate heat changes, as air has relatively little mass associated with it. Ocean heat changes are the dominant factor for global heat changes."
Source (http://www.climate4you.com)
Moderator Response:[DB] "Surely the instability in the reconstructed temperature record is a legitimate cause for concern"
You document no instability, so you posit a strawman. Further, Humlum's nonsense has been debunked in this venue before (here and here, notably), so if you wish to address anything from him, take it to one of those threads. Not here. Further, no matter where you place comments at Skeptical Science, the Burden of Proof is on you to bring credible evidence to support your claims.
Further, your supposed quote is actually from here.
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Joel_Huberman at 23:25 PM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
Agreed. The important message, as stated in Dana's last section heading, is "We need to cut carbon pollution ASAP."
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HK at 23:14 PM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
In a summary of the global temperature in 2016, James Hansen et al start with a discussion of what the term "preindustrial" really means and argue that the period 1880-1920 is appropriate. They then present a global temperature graph with that baseline, and conclude that the best estimate of global warming since "preindustrial" time is 1.07°C based on the linear trend since 1970.
When I did the same with the Berkeley Earth data, but used the linear trend since 1975 instead of 1970, my "end-of trend" result was 1.14°C. With the 1880-1920 baseline the BE temperature in 2016 was 1.34°C, so it seems that the 2016 El Niño boosted the global temperature by 0.2°C.
Therefore it’s not necessary to move the "preindustrial" back several hundred years to reach the conclusion that the global warming has already crossed the 1°C threshold. -
Baraliuh at 22:59 PM on 25 July 2017It's methane
When will you update this nonsense that CH4 is not increasing anymore?
As it definetly is:
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends_ch4/ -
Kevin C at 20:02 PM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
I agree in part and disagree in part.
To the extent that the 1.5 and 2C warming limits are social conventions, I agree.
However there is an objective component to the amount of warming since pre-industrial. If climate model simulations reliably show a particular impact at 1.5C vs pre-industrial, then we should probably work on the hypothsis that that impact will appear at that level of warming compared to pre-industrial. The key is then to define 'vs pre-industrial' in the same way between the models and observations. That's not a trivial step, and requires an understanding of the forcings used in both historical and control runs - I would need to look into that further.
I like the paper. The implications, which dominate the media coverage, are something to which I need to give more thought.
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bjchip at 19:31 PM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
Agreed with the others here. This feels too much like moving the goalposts and realistically we've only ever worked from the basic late-1800's starting point. Moreover, it feels foolish to me, to be specifying over a tenth of a degree when we can't know the sensitivity that well or actually get any indication that we are going to stop before we hit 4 or 5 degrees. We have not really even slowed down and adding more to the target will not I think, help us to change course.
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nigelj at 16:05 PM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
There is this theory that human agriculture and deforestation, starting when farming first emerged which is approximately 12,000 years ago caused some warming. I think it's a plausible theory, but was clearly a modest increase in temperature over many thousands of years. This has no comparison to the more rapid, and clearly unsustainable, damaging, warming from fossil fuels, so should not be used as some form of baseline point.
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nigelj at 09:03 AM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
I totally had the same reaction as OPOF. Focussing too much on pre-industrial temperatures wont help.
Pre-industrial temperatures are of some scientific interest, and the work of Rudiman is worth reading in this regard, but were not that much different anyway so of no huge practical use to the discussions about reducing emisssions.
It's of deep scientific interest, but will only confuse the Paris issue and sidetrack the more practical discussions on emissions targets and reductions, in unhelpul energy wasting directions, and will play into the hands of the denialists.
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One Planet Only Forever at 07:53 AM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
The scientific investigation of what the real pre-industrial temperature was is a dangerous, and unnecessary, 'debate' to open up.
At the time of the Paris Agreement the global average of the late-1800's was understood to be the starting point for the 2.0 C and 1.5 C limits.
The warming imposed by human activity prior to the late-1800s is not relevant even if it can be considered to also be pre-industrial. It is a purely scientific exercise. If there was 0.1 C before the late-1800s then the limits become 2.1 C and 1.6 C above that lower starting point.
The danger is that some smart delayers will claim that this is just more proof that climate scientists are still debating the science. They will be able to gather popular support by claiming that world leaders (who all need regional popularity to remain leaders) would be irresponsible if they acted on understanding that was still not well understood/agreed to. And each region of the developed and developing world has a large potentially easily infuenced portion of its population, a portion that perceives the required changes to their way of living/benefiting to be a personal negative that they will not 'vote for' (and many of them are correct because they currently live in ways that have developed very far in incorrect/unsustainable/damaging directions or they perceive opportunities for personal benefit from the pursuit of activity that is incorrect/unsustainable/damaging).
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One Planet Only Forever at 07:25 AM on 25 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
nigelj@90,
I would strongly advise against the belief that important matters should be allowed to be based on popularity or profitability. History is full of cases where what is popular or profitable was actually well understood to be unacceptable while it maintained popular support or profitability.
There seems to be more of that type of unacceptable popularity and profitability in some developed/advanced societies. So things are not really advancing in spite of new artificial technological things being developed.
Perceptions and desires appear to be more easily made 'popular' than increased awareness and better understanding. That means that 'leaders' have to be tasked with the responsibility to be more aware and better understand what is going on and apply that to actually sustainably make things better for everyone, no one unjustifiably harmed by actions that help others (justified harm is changing or correcting a person's incorrectly developed perceptions of prosperity, superiority, or opportunity and that is something that responmsible leaders would 'have to do'. And though that is not really 'harmful' the person being corrected will perceive it as a harm to them, as a threat to be feared).
And anyone in a position of leadership that acts contrary to the above requirement deserves to 'legally' have their power and influence curtailed (until they can prove they have changed their mind and become responsibly helpful).
That is how significant threats are being dealt with today. All that remains regarding 'climate science and the required changes of human activity that it has identified' is the global recognition that people in leadership roles who act less responsibly deserve to be legally removed from those roles regardless of their potential for regional election popularity or popularity among shareholders because of the short-term profitability they can get away with by willingly behaving less responsibly, less acceptably.
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Climate Clive at 02:16 AM on 25 July 2017Study: our Paris carbon budget may be 40% smaller than thought
Dana,
Can you confirm, from your point of view, if you see us being able to saty below 2 deg? In this article you say with Ratcheting we could achieve 1.8 deg but I have heard, over and over, that the warming in the system already will get us above that. Kevin Andersons Emperors new clothes presentation shows how absurd reaching 2 deg is even if you believe in tech not invented yet that gets us negative emmissions.
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nigelj at 14:12 PM on 24 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Scaddenp @89, yes the work on ethics is really more an understanding of the issue in a psychological sense, of what some of our deep seated traits are and their biological origins. It doesnt do a lot to help us decide what to do.
Questions of right and wrong, good and bad are partly matters of conviction and belief, or value judgements. There are no convenient equations that tell us what to do. The science of ethics can give us some clues, or inform the debate, but can't direct the decisions.
But I think we can have a few ethical principles that might be useful: We have the principle of rights of individuals to do as they wish, provided they dont significantly harm others, and this is the basis of many laws. It could be applied to questions of whether genetic engineering should be allowed, but its unlikely to be a sufficient criterion. The issue is very large and so will need a lot of thought.
And who would decide limitations on genetic engineering and ethical standards? The experts? Politicians using a conscience vote? Or do we put fundamental issues about genetic engineering to the public in some referendum?
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scaddenp at 13:30 PM on 24 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
On ethics, I think science is doing very interesting investigations on how with think ethically and why etc. However, those descriptive models are not that useful in my opinion for actually deciding ethical questions.
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nigelj at 12:31 PM on 24 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Scaddenp @87, yes consensus doesn't require unanimity. Anything above 90% is very strong I would say.
I wasn't being clear. It was really just an observation of how a few people come up with various objections even to changing genes that cause disease, however they might do this more out of concern with the methods and politics.
Yes science can inform on genetics and the big questions appear largely ethical. On the other hand, science might have something to say about ethics. Quite a lot is being published on evolutionary origins of morality and ethics. For example "Behave, by Robert Sapolsky".
However ethical decisons and issues are sure challenging and may come down to what society agrees on as a whole, and will no doubt become politicised as well!
I'm just an interested lay person on all this and suspect you have more knowledge of the hard science of genetics.
I would bet society will do what it often does and compromise. Some genetic engineering will be allowed but with various approvals required and ethical guidelines, and thats not a bad approach. The thing will be approached slowly and cautiously like drug liberalisation moves around the world, to see if there are any hidden problems.
Yes the AGW debate is at least largely different and more about the science, and methods of emissions reduction, and costs etc. Although OPOF has raised an interesting ethical / political perspective on it.
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nigelj at 12:12 PM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Even criticisms of Jacobsen admit he is right in theory, and its more practical and cost criticisms. However from what I have read, the criticisms are none too robust anyway.
Renewables can work without nuclear or gas fired, provided they had a lot of wind and solar, enough wind surplus to ensure theres enough electricity even in low wind conditions, or alternatively storage options of various types. This might however become more expensive than the nuclear option in some countries, so nuclear might be preferable in some cases.
What happened to thorium reactors? They were supposed to solve all the usual nuclear problems.
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nigelj at 11:29 AM on 24 July 2017Climate denial is like The Matrix; more Republicans are choosing the red pill
Thoughts on Bjorn Lomberg.
His environmental scepticism has consistently been shown to be discredited and badly informed. Hes an economist not an environmental scientist. Although this doesnt automatically mean he is wrong, it means he does not bring much formal training to books on the environment.
I have had some trouble reconcling this climate sceptics scepticism with his involvement in some worthy looking social causes and advocacy. Normally people active in these sorts of areas are receptive to climate science.
It is staring us in the face. Lomberg is a leader in the Copenhagen Consensus Center's advocacy for data-driven smart solutions to global challenges. This means he has a vested interests in resources going into his consultancy on multiple projects, rather than climate mitigation.
I also think it's essentially cynical of Lomberg to attack Californias efforts on emissions. They are not the only place making an effort, and it has not hurt their economy. Like the comment above we have to start somewhere.
Ideally we want all countries to move equally in tandem, but its not happening. I would be more impressed with Lomberg if he gave us some ideas how we could better get everyone to move on the issue. Anyone can be a critic or sceptic, theres nothing easier. But I think his priorities are his consulting work, not climate change.
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scaddenp at 11:19 AM on 24 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Well consensus doesnt necessarily imply unanimity.
I do agree that gene technologies are arriving that are leading to questions about a "new eugenics". It has to answer the same questions about effectiness, ethics and targets. Science can inform that debate (eg what percentage of time you can expect CRISPR to miss the target) but the bigger questions are not for science to answer. That debate is very different to the one about AGW.
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Rob Honeycutt at 11:09 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Rust... Being that I'm responding to someone claiming definitively that renewables "will not by themselves be an adequate response", I believe there is enough research to suggest that might not be the case.
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nigelj at 10:53 AM on 24 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Scaddenp @85
I agree there was probably a social consensus that it would be better defective genes did not exist. However I have seen a few people argue let nature take its course, possibly sometimes for religious reasons and other reasons.
Genetic counselling makes plenty of sense to me. This leads to the issue of how we really define eugenics, and there’s nothing wrong with counselling, but the trouble is if you say this you get labelled a nazi by some people. Its the forced or coercive aspects of Eugenics of most concern.
Regarding your points:
1) I will accept you can’t silence these genes effectively with sterilisation. I take your word for it because I haven’t done university level genetics.
However doesn’t the new crisper technology have huge potential to fix these problems?
2) Regarding is forced sterilisation ethical, this set’s off big alarm bells for me. It’s a huge use of state power, authoritarian power, to dictate biological function of private individuals. Children born with defects are of no great harm to society, and it’s normally harm caused that would justify state intervention. The procedure is open to considerable potential abuse.
I wouldn’t rule it out 100%, because we always have to balance desirable individual rights and freedoms, with justified rights of community expressed through state power and law, but you would need a solid justification like a widespread problem or emergency. As you point out sterilisation doesn’t work too well, and I’m not sure the problem is large enough to justify something forced, even if it did work. The one issue is whether children become a burden on the state, in state care, but we aren’t seeing a massive problem in my country.
It may be that simply discouraging some of these pregnancies is enough by simply providing parents with good information. Alternatively there would be nothing wrong with state incentives, but this would get complicated and contentious.
The new crisper technology might be such an easy solution it resolves the issue.
It’s also like vaccinations. I’m in favour, but nervous about the idea of making it compulsory.
However we make manufacturers add iodine to salt. But the reasons appear overwhelming so this is a case that appears justified and safe.
3)What is defective? Yeah exactly where do you draw the line and who decides, doctors, the state, family?
This leads on to designer babies where people want blue eyes, genes that encourage intelligence or stamina, whatever. Of course nobody in their right mind would force these things on anyone, that would truly be Orwellian, but it leaves the questions of a) should doctors be allowed to provide these options? b) should parents be encouraged or discouraged?
It opens the pandoras box of a genetically engineered civilisation. Better and smarter, perhaps, but this would probably come with risks. We would be narrowing the gene pool wouldn’t we?
Just generally, I’m an advocate for parents having good information on genetic problems. I think the state has a role to ensure this happens, but going beyond this is harder to say. However it’s hard to stop the march of technology, and if we can develop technology that can genetically engineer humans, it’s tough to know what we should do.
There’s something scary about the notion, yet its hard to see a non emotive reason that such procedures would be banned. I suspect it may be a case of looking at specific issues, or classes of issues on their merits and having some ethical guidelines and laws, and limits if there appear to be risks with specific procedures or issues, or they are done for trivial and badly informed reasons. The process will need to be managed I would say.
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scaddenp at 10:06 AM on 24 July 2017The Larsen C ice shelf collapse hammers home the reality of climate change
Well as per last paragraph in the article, data is limited so it is not easy to make definitive statements linking the calving event (which is after all a natural event on ice shelves) to specific aspects of global warming. I think scientists are correct in not jumping to conclusions for which there is insufficient hard evidence.
I understand there are efforts to measure sea temperature and bottom melt on the Ross ice shelf which may show whether there is a link between future calving and the warming ocean. Perhaps other research groups are doing the same for Larsen?
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citizenschallenge at 09:56 AM on 24 July 2017The Larsen C ice shelf collapse hammers home the reality of climate change
Well, it's a done deal, as the beat goes on.
projectmidas.org/blog/calving/
I find that their press release presents us with another epic example of a gross Failure to Communicate Climate Science reality. Or playing by the Koch/Murdoch script.
Can anyone explain how Dr Martin O’Leary, a Swansea University glaciologist and member of the MIDAS project team could possibly say the following about the calving:
“Although this is a natural event, and we’re not aware of any link to human-induced climate change, this puts the ice shelf in a very vulnerable position. This is the furthest back that the ice front has been in recorded history. ”
Moderator Response:[JH] Sloganeering snipped.
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scaddenp at 07:28 AM on 24 July 2017Surrendering to fear brought us climate change denial and President Trump
Good points Nigel. I think that you could say that there is social consensus that it would be better if defective alleles that lead to say Huntington's, cystic fibrosis, etc didnt exist. I doubt that geneticists now or then would have contested the point that a species would be better without "bad" genes. Even now, many countries would be taking measures of one sort or another ("genetic counselling") to prevent baby-making where there is a high probability of a major defect.
From that point on, however, things become more complicated.
1/ Do you have an effective means of removing or siliencing defective genes? - Norton's calculation shows sterilization is pretty ineffective for instance.
2/ Is that means ethical? This has historically been the main battleground and strictly speaking is outside science.
3/ What is "defective"? The other major battleground. Early eugenist also clearly had a belief in single gene to characteristic mapping that was unsupported by science.
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nigelj at 07:10 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Singleton engineer, You say nuclear must be in the mix, but have not provided an actual reason?
Provided countries have a reasonable mix of renewable options, they are unlikely to need nuclear. As evidence, my country is quite small and already has over 80% renewables and are told we can get to 100%. We have good renewable resources, so simply dont need to even consider nuclear power. Its more expensive than wind power for us, and has obvious safety issues. So please explain to me why nuclear would have to be in our mix?
But I can see that a country with poor levels of sunlight and wind may consider nuclear. Its a geographical issue, and a costs and benefits issue.
But I would say countries should explore other options first in preference where possible, because I dont particularly think we should encourage wide proliferation of traditional forms of nuclear given safety issues.
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nigelj at 06:47 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Wili @4, yes I understand your point. I knew someone would post a response something like yours.
But how far do we go scaring people? Sometimes I want to say very scary things to wake people up and get their attention, but this can totally backfire.
I'm with Michael Mann. Doomsday scenarious will just be depressing and won't convince hardened denialists or politicians. I like Steven King novels, but we probably dont want to present climate change in that way do we?
Like I tried to say, and you seem to have ignored it, is we should have controlled scary stuff that frames the issue urgently, but in a measured, intelligent, adult way.
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rustneversleeps at 05:53 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
No, RobH. There is not "plenty" of research to that effect. Jacobson's work is a huge outlier and widely rejected by most researchers in the field.
Granted, Leo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo endorse it. But other scientists, not so much.
Moderator Response:[JH] Recommended reading:
100% Clean, Renewable Energy Is Possible, Practical, Logical — Setting The Record Straight by Karl Burkart, Clean Technica, July 22, 2017
The Attacks On Cleantech Leaders Have Begun — Expect More by Zachary Sahan, Clean Technica, July 23, 2017 -
ubrew12 at 05:12 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #29
"Arctic sea ice is declining at a rate of 13.3% per decade." Is this for area or volume? I expect the rate for volume is twice that. In any case, it may be helpful to say which it is.
"it’s been a surprise to climate scientists that 2017 has been so remarkably warm " It's never good when the scientists are surprised. This is just speculation: could this be related to the rise in CO2? As recently noted in the NYT: "excess carbon dioxide... rose at the highest rate on record in 2015 and 2016... Scientists are concerned... because... the amount... people are pumping... seems to have stabilized...". Many of us have been concerned that CO2 emissions could begin occuring outside human control. Could this be happening already?
I also think the recent temperature run-up could be related to the Chinese acting to reduce their coal combustion (whose aerosols may have been helping cool the planet). That would work on the short timescales here.
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One Planet Only Forever at 04:10 AM on 24 July 2017Planet Hacks: Stuff
The 20 minute long 2007 "Story of Stuff" movie presents an even more comprehensive story about Stuff. A key component is the references to marketing that tempts people to buy things. A key component of marketing is limiting information that is presented and deliberate attempts to distort the perceptions, awareness and understanding about things.
People freer to believe whatever they want to excuse what they want to do clearly cannot be expected to develop sustainable constantly improved results. The ones getting away with behaving less acceptably have a real and perceived advantage over more caring and considerate people. And the ones most effectively creating delusions can be the biggest winners for as long as people can be tempted to accept/like the delusions.
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One Planet Only Forever at 03:44 AM on 24 July 2017Climate denial is like The Matrix; more Republicans are choosing the red pill
BBHY@16,
A better explanation of the absurdity of Lomborg's claim about the irrelevance of California acting to curtail its 1% of global total trouble making is: California's 40 million people are 0.53% of the total global population of 7.5 billion. So their 1% is double the average per-capita impact. And there are some people in California doing far more impact than others. So the largest trouble-makers in California are more than twice as bad as the global average and the global average has to be reduced to zero. A very good way to get to zero is to focus on scaling back the impacts of the bigger trouble-makers.
Looking at the Wikipedia presentation of USA states per-capita CO2 impacts, the impacts of California are actually far lower than most states (not a big fan of Wikipedia as a reference but this information presentation was quick to validate). So in a way, Bjorn is correct. The reduction of the per-capita impacts by other states should be the focus. But responsible national leadership will clearly be required for that (regional Winning leadership is clearly failing to care). California can only strive to Lead by Example (and they should be admired if they truly effectively reduce the impacting by the highest impacting portions of their population - like shutting down their dirty oil production).
And a better analogy than a journey of 100 miles is a condominium community that has developed the nasty habit of everyone pooping outside rather than face the costs of connecting to a community sewage treatment system and paying per-unit for their waste. And some members of the condominium are doing far more pooping than others, but all of the pooping outside has to stop. Bjorn is arguing that the households that comprise 0.53% of the population but contribute 1% of the outside pooping should not act to reduce the amount of popping outside done by the biggest poopers in their households. It is true that there are other housholds that per-person poop a lot more. But that is no excuse for 'The Leaders of the households in the California portion of the condo group' to not reduce the outside pooping done by the biggest poopers in their housholds.
An even better analogy to the global situation is a community of people that poops outdoors in the communities that are far away from them. That is the way many of the wealthiest in the supposedly most advanced or fastest advancing nations have been behaving since 1972 when the Stockholm Conference made it undeniable that the wealthy needed to stop sloppily harvesting non-renewable resources and gobbling them up for personal benefit (reducing the resources avaialble in the future) and pooping their damage results all over the world, piling up bigger problems that future generations would have to try to dig out of.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:36 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
SingletonEngineer... While it's likely nuclear will be a part of the future energy generation mix, there's plenty of research that demand can be 100% supplied by a variety of renewables.
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SingletonEngineer at 00:04 AM on 24 July 20172017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #29
Quote: "2) massive government investment in renewables..."
This recommendation (demand?) is an illogical insult to one's intelligence in at least two ways: (1) The claim that renewables, by themselves, are the best available response to the threat of climate change; and (2) governments are wholly responsible for the cost of transition to low CO2 emitting technologies.
We need to ensure that our future is energy-rich. I'm convinced that this will require, as a minimum, two essential features:
1. That the desirable shift is to low- or zero-CO2 emitting technologies.
2. That renewables, ie wind and solar energy plus percentages of geothermal, wave and tidal sources, will not by themselves be an adequate response - nuclear power is an essential component of the mix, as also severely reductions in industrial processes that result in CO2e emissions, such as current primary methods of smelting iron and manufacturing cement.
Moderator Response:[JH] Please speify the source of the quote you have cited.
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