Roger Pielke Jr.'s Blog

Some Items Not Blogged Last Week

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Sat, 26 May 2012 19:03:00 +0000

I've been away this past week so I had little time to blog a few blog-worthy items that crossed my desk. Below is a quick round up of some of the most interesting ones.

Above is a music video featuring some local (to where I am now) talent. Normal service returns after the holiday and we see how well I perform in the Bolder Boulder with jet lag;-)

A California lawmaker proposes that the state cap the number of out-of-state university students. The Chancellor of UC -Berkeley explains that this would kill the golden goose: "non-residents represent a crucial revenue stream for the campus." There is a solution here, and trust me, it is coming.
Mark Henderson, head of communication at the Wellcome Trust, has a new book out in the UK on science and policy -- The Geek's Manifesto -- which received a glowing review from James Wilsdon in today's FT. I will check it out and report back.
Separately, I saw a nice quote from Henderson: "There's very little of what you might term "anti-science" in politics" which is spot on and follows from some of the blog/twitter discussion of GM crops over the past days.
Baredo et al. 2012 is a new paper on floods in Spain, and ho hum, guess what? After adjusting for societal changes, "there remains no residual signal that might be attributable to other influences, in particular anthropogenic climate change... and serves again to confirm that at this juncture, societal influences remain the prime factors driving insured and economic losses from natural disasters."
The US National Academy of Sciences has agreed to take on a challenging study related to a highly politicized issue that has centered on science, but which is really about politics. The issue centers on the environmental impacts of a California oyster farm. The issue has Democrats and Republicans trading hats in the "war on science" narrative, so it has received little attention from usual sources.
I have a new column out in Bridges on The Great American Manufacturing Battle. Excerpt: "a focus on health care, education, immigration, and taxes generally makes more sense than creating special policies in support of particular sectors of the economy." The manufacturing skeptics are winning out over the manufacturing romantics.
The WSJ (!) takes issue with a truly dumb Republican proposal to terminate US government data collection vuia the US Census: "Republicans try to kill data collection that helps economic growth."
Earlier in the week Nobel Prize winning economist Alan Blinder had an absolutely brilliant op-ed in the WSJon the importance of fiscal stimulus in the context of the current US economic context. I'd love to hear a cogent rebuttal, but I have seen nothing. Excerpt: "So, as long as the government can borrow on reasonable terms, the crucial short-run question is: Does the economy need more or less demand?"
Blinder's op-ed reminded me of these comments from Martin Wolf in the FT almost 2 weeks ago, writing on David Cameron's foolish approach to austerity: "With real interest rates close to zero – yes, zero – it is impossible to believe that the government cannot find investments to make itself, or investments it can make with the private sector, or private investments whose tail risks it can insure that do not earn more than the real cost of funds. If that were not true, the UK would be finished"

Coming next week on this blog ... an extended series of posts on economics, innovation, technology. Stay tuned!

UK GM Wheat War: Not Really About Science

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 23 May 2012 10:07:00 +0000

In the UK there is a battle brewing over a scientific trial involving genetically modified wheat. Last weekend a protester attempted to vandalize the trial, and a larger civil action is expected on May 27. The ongoing battle, and its close cousin in the climate wars, tell us something about what can happen to science when it becomes the central battleground over politics and technology. Unfortunately, the scientific community itself has contributed to such tactics.

A Nature editorial explains what is going on:

Plant scientists at Rothamsted Research, a complex of buildings and fields in Hertfordshire, UK, that prides itself on being the longest-running agricultural research station in the world, have spent years preparing for their latest experiment — which will attempt to prove the usefulness of a genetically modified (GM) wheat that emits an aphid alarm pheromone, potentially reducing aphid infestation.

Yet instead of looking forward to watching their crop grow, the Rothamsted scientists are nervously counting the days until 27 May, when protesters against GM crops have promised to turn up in force and destroy the experimental plots.

The protest group, it must be acknowledged, has a great name — Take the Flour Back. And it no doubt believes that it has the sympathy of the public. The reputation of GM crops and food in Britain, and in much of mainland Europe, has yet to recover from the battering it took in the late 1990s. In Germany, the routine destruction of crops by protesters has meant that scientists there simply don't bother to conduct GM experiments any more.

The Rothamsted scientists have also attempted to win over the public, with a media campaign that explains what they are trying to do and why. After the protesters announced their plans to “decontaminate” the research site, the scientists tried to engage with their opponents, and pleaded with them to “reconsider before it is too late, and before years of work to which we have devoted our lives are destroyed forever”. The researchers say that in this case they are the true environmentalists. The modified crop, if it works, would lower the demand for environmentally damaging insecticides.

It would be a mistake to conclude that the protesters are in some way anti-science or fearful that the genetically modified crops might fail to work as advertised (though surely some protesters do have these views). Their main concern is that the crops will perform exactly as advertised, and lead to further gains in agricultural productivity.

It is not science that they fear, but the implications of scientific advances for economic and political outcomes. The organization leading the UK protests calls itself Take the Flour Back, and clearly explains its rationale as follows:

Our current political system chooses to deal with world hunger through the model of “food security”, arguing that there is not enough food to go around and that we need techno-fixes to solve this. This approach ignores the fact that there is a global food surplus – many people just can’t afford to buy food. This problem is being amplified by land grabs- communities that used to grow food for themselves are being forced out of their ancestral homes, often by corporations expanding cash crop production.

The industrial food system throws away (in the journey from farms to traders, food processors and supermarkets), between a third and a half of all the food that it produces – enough to feed the world’s hungry six times over. (2)

Free trade policies imposed by the International Monetary Fund make it much harder for governments to protect small and family farmers from big multinationals. With the expansion of free-market capitalism, agricultural systems in many countries in the global south have become focused on producing cash crops for export to rich western nations. At the same time, their markets have been opened to food imports, including imports from US and EU companies at less than the cost of production. US farmers benefit from billions of dollars in subsidies which make up as much as 40% of US net farm income. This means they can afford to export their crops at well below production cost. (3) This is ruining the livelihoods of small farmers in the global south.

This is not the statement of a group concerned primarily with the potential unanticipated risks of GM crops to the environment or people, but rather, it is the manifesto of a group concerned that GM crops will perform exactly as intended.

Like many issues where science and politics intersect, those opposed to the productivity gains made possible by agricultural innovation have sought to use science as a basis for realizing political ends. A primary strategy in such efforts is typically to argue that the science compels a particular political outcome. In the case of GM crops, opponents of the technology (mainly in Europe) have argued that the techniques are unproven or risky. However, such tactics have not succeeded. So the next step beyond waging a political battle over science is now direct action against the technology of concern.

This situation is of course in many respects parallel to the climate debate. Efforts to compel emissions reductions through invocations that science compels certain political outcomes have borne little fruit, so some activists have taken it upon themselves to directly attack the technologies at the focus of their concern.

One difference between the climate wars and the GM wars is that some prominent scientists are participating in the direct action against technology (such as James Hansen and IPCC contributor Marc Jaccard). Another important difference is that in the case of GM crops, it is research itself being targeted, and the scientific community objects.

One argument invoked by scientists in support of GM technology is that the world needs more food. But the world needs more energy too. In condoning direct attacks on energy technologies, the scientific community may have opened the door to tactics that it does not much like when they are applied closer to home.

Beyond Manna from Heaven

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Mon, 21 May 2012 15:24:00 +0000

Writing at The Breakthrough Journal blog, Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger argue that conventional economics is not up to the task of offering sound policy advice for the 21st century. They write

In the 70 years that have passed since Joseph Schumpeter coined the term "creative destruction," economists have struggled awkwardly with how to think about growth and innovation. Born of the low-growth agricultural economies of 18th Century Europe, the dismal science to this day remains focused on the question of how to most efficiently distribute scarce resources, not on how to create new ones -- this despite two centuries of rapid economic growth driven by disruptive technologies, from the steam engine to electricity to the Internet.

There are some important, if qualified, exceptions. Sixty years ago, Nobelist Robert Solow and colleagues calculated that more than 80 percent of long-term growth derives from technological change. But neither Solow nor most other economists offered much explanation beyond that. Technological change was, in the words of one of Solow's contemporaries, "manna from heaven."

Where does that "manna from heaven" originate? In pricing incentives, of course, derived from economic theory. But once you take a closer look at both practice and the theoretical origins, you find that economics explains far less than we've been led to believe.

Nordhaus and Shellenberger revisit the climate issue to illustrate how far conventional economics has led us astray. They provide an overview of a debate that they engaged in with an economist from the Environmental Defense Fund, Gernot Wagner, who argues against evidence and common sense that by creating the right pricing incentives, drastic emissions reductions goals can be met in the near term:

"[W]e can achieve US emissions reduction goals for 2020 and possibly even 2030 through deployment of existing technologies. . . Price goes up, demand goes down. Economists typically call it the 'law of demand'--one of the very few laws we've got."

The theory is sound, its application is not -- a point that readers of this blog and The Climate Fix will well understand.

The good news is that many are beginning to move beyond the precepts of economic theory and take a look at the simple mathematics of the real world. For instance, Ulrich Hoffmann, an economist at the UN Conference on Trade and Development, has done the math, which is illustrated in the figure below showing how much the world would need to decarbonize its economic activity in order to stabilize carbon dioxide at 450 ppm.

Based on these straightforward mathematics he concludes (Hoffmann has a more in-depth analysis here in PDF):

The arithmetic of economic and population growth, efficiency limits related to the rebound effect, as well as systemic issues call into question the hopes of decoupling economic growth from GHG growth. One should not deceive oneself into believing that such an evolutionary (and often reductionist) approach would be sufficient to cope with the complexities of climate change. “Green growth” proponents need to scrutinise the historical macro- (not micro-) economic evidence, in particular the arithmetic of economic and population growth, as well as the significant influence of the rebound effect.

Such messages are not well-received by conventional economists. In their exchange, Wagner explains to Nordhaus and Shellenberger that economic theory trumps real world evidence, and this means that debate over such issues is not necessary:

The main points from climate economics are no longer up for debate: carbon is a pollutant; we need make polluters pay, either through a cap or a price. Virtually all economists agree--from Holtz-Eakin, Laffer and Mankiw on one side to Stiglitz, Sachs, and Krugman on the other.

Once again, this one is not up for debate. You can argue that politically we can't get there, so we need to do other things in the short term, but it's not up for debate whether this is the economically correct solution.

Like most debates on climate this one ends predictably, with Wagner appealing to the motives of Shellenberger and Nordhaus:

[Y]our entire operation seems to be geared toward propagating contrarian-sounding views that once in a while get you some attention and get picked up by an editor somewhere, but otherwise are just that: contrarian for the sake of wanting to be different from the pack

Snore. But the larger point here is that there are articles of faith in the discipline of economics which are viewed as taboo to challenge, even when they fail to represent themselves in practice with the simplicity and elegance of theory.

However, a closer look at economic theory finds a much shakier foundation than is represented within the discipline. Writing at Slate, Konstantin Kakaes has a great piece that sums up how economics went astray when it comes to innovation:

Robert Solow, winner of the 1987 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, is famous for, in the recent words of a high-ranking State Department official, “showing that technological innovation was responsible for over 80 percent of economic growth in the United States between 1909 and 1949.”. . Typically, technical or technological progress isn’t explicitly defined by those invoking Solow, but people take it to mean new gadgets.

However, Solow meant something much broader. On the first page of “Technical Change and the Aggregate Production Function,” the second of his two major papers, he wrote: “I am using the phrase ‘technical change’ as a shorthand expression for any kind of shift in the production function. Thus slowdowns, speedups, improvements in the education of the labor force, and all sorts of things will appear as ‘technical change.’ ” But his willfully inclusive definition tends to be forgotten.

Solow was constructing a simple mathematical model of how economic growth takes place. On one side was output. On the other side was capital and labor. Classical economists going back to Adam Smith and David Ricardo had defined the “production function”—how much stuff you got out of the economy—in terms of capital and labor (as well as land). Solow’s point was that other factors besides capital, labor, and land were important. But he knew his limitations: He wasn’t clear on what those factors were. This is why he defined “technical change” as any kind of shift (the italics are his) in the production function. He wasn’t proving that technology was important, as economists in recent years have taken to saying he did. All Solow was saying is that the sources of economic growth are poorly understood.

Instead of "technology" Solow was really talking about "innovation." That innovation need not be understood because it was "manna from heaven" is characteristic of many arguments from conventional economists and is particularly endemic in the climate debate. From such a perspective, of course anyone asking about where innovation comes from -- other than from the magic of the invisible hand -- must either be ignorant or malign.

But as Hoffmann's essay explains, once you actually do the math of energy innovation in the context of real-world social and political forces, you see that understanding processes of innovation requires more than simply understanding the "law of demand."

Kakaes contines:

The cautionary tale of Solow is emblematic of how economists get science and technology wrong. One economist creates a highly idealized mathematical model. The model’s creator is, as Solow was, honest about its limitations. But it quickly gets passed through the mill and acquires authority by means of citation. A few years after Solow’s paper came out, Kenneth Arrow, another Nobel Prize winner, would write that Solow proved the “overwhelming importance [of technological change in economic growth] relative to capital formation.” It’s a sort of idea laundering: Solow said that we don’t know where growth in economic output comes from and, for want of a better alternative, termed that missing information “technical change.” But his admission of ignorance morphed into a supposed proof that new technologies drive economic growth.

Remarkably, in the 21st century, our policy debates reflect the fact that we do not have a good idea where innovation comes from, how it is directed and how we prepare for its inevitable downsides. Too often conventional economics presents an an obstacle to debating and discussing this topic.

As Nordhaus and Shellenberger conclude,

Over the next century, global energy demand will double, and perhaps triple. But even were energy consumption to stay flat, significantly reducing emissions from today's levels will require the creation of disruptive new technologies. It's a task for which a doctrine focused on the efficient allocation of scarce resources could hardly be more ill-suited.

Read the three essays discussed here in full at The Breakthrough Journal blog, at Bridges Trade BioRes review, and at Slate.

Updated: The US Intense Hurricane Drought

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 16 May 2012 16:10:00 +0000

In preparation for an upcoming talk, I have updated the figure above to the start of the 2012 hurricane season, which will begin with a record-long stretch of no intense hurricane landfalls still continuing. (In most browsers you can click on the figure for a larger view.) The long stretch with no intense hurricane landfalls has surely shaped expectations, setting the stage for all sorts of animal spirits to be in play. Oh, to be a commodities trader this summer.

Below is a figure showing the intra-seasonal distribution of US intense hurricane landfalls. About 8% have occurred in June and July, and more than 75% in August in September. (UPDATE: This figure has been updated from the original posted to fix an error in the median date.)

Reducing Unemployment: Manufacturing vs. Services

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Mon, 14 May 2012 23:16:00 +0000

The graph above answers a question I've wondered about for a bit:

By how much would the services and manufacturing sectors each have to grow employment in order to reduce the current rate of unemployment by 1%?

The answer is 1.3% growth in employment in the services sector and 12.9% in the manufacturing sector. (Data is for April, 2012, and can be found here for employment and unemployment, and here for employment in the service sand manufacturing sectors).

This graph explains that while the current uptick in manufacturing employment is worth noting and welcoming, growth in manufacturing employment is not going to be the primary long-term solution to bringing down unemployment. That said, even though manufacturing and services are distinct categories of economic accounts, they are of course inter-related within the broader economy. However, claims that special treatment for manufacturing will reduce unemployment have a high hill to climb in terms of the simple math that follows from the small portion of the economy that manufacturing employment currently comprises. Productivity gains make that hill even steeper.

And of course, do not forget that from the perspective of employment rather than economic sectors, all jobs are service jobs.

What I Learned this Week

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Fri, 11 May 2012 14:46:00 +0000

My tiff with Joe Romm and the Center for American Progress this week taught me a few lessons and put a finer points on ones that I have already known:

Political debate is rough business, politics ain't beanbag
There are people and institutions whose business is to try to tear people down, to savage their reputation in order to avoid a debate on policy substance
No appeal to reason, honor or dignity matters to such people
They will lie to your face and to everyone else without batting an eye if they think they can get away with it
When caught in an obvious fabrication they will pretend to make it go away and that it never happened, while doing everything possible to spread the lie far and wide

What can one do in such situations?

Recognize that your character is being attacked because they feel that they cannot engage you on substance, an implicit argument that they see your arguments as better or unimpeachable
Recognize that their megaphone is bigger than yours, always will be
Recognize that because they are more influential and connected than you are, that non-combatants will generally (often silently, but sometimes overtly) side with the more powerful -- this is a fact of life and no use complaining about
Recognize that appeals to reason, honor, dignity will be ignored or used as a means to further inflict damage on you
Recognize that you have choices -- to drop out of debate, ignore, joke, quietly correct or return fire-with-fire

I have tried a lot of these strategies over the past years to respond to efforts at character assassination, of which I have had my fair share of;-) I don't really like any of the responses, as they all have positive and negative outcomes. But, if one can't take the heat, one should get out of the kitchen. And if one stays in the kitchen, then that means learning to cook with gas.

This week I respond to Romm and CAP's buckets of mud with an aggressive and loud response. Sometimes bullies should be stood up to.

Was it the right response? I am not sure, but it certainly was effective. Romm's dozen or more updates and changes to his post full of lies were undignified and embarrassing, and certainly an admission of wrong-doing. CAP's outright lie to me that they stood by their reporting even as they were erasing evidence of their fabrications was laughable.

For anyone paying attention -- and I don't blame anyone for not -- this week's episode shows clearly the moral bankruptcy of the vicious element of US political discourse, which exists on both sides of political debate. One organization used a billboard campaign to associate their opponents with mass murderers -- character assassination to be sure. Another organization then used lies to try to associate me with the first organization -- more character assassination. Apparently, appreciation of irony is in short supply these days.

I do not expect to have to engage in open warfare with Romm or CAP in the future, given the degree to which they have embarrassed themselves this week. However, should they continue to try to savage my reputation and harm my career, I will not take it lightly.

For my part, I will continue to call things like I see them, and will welcome debate with (and especially with) those with whom I generally disagree with, ideologically, politically or substantively -- and that means even with vile organizations like CAP and Heartland.

As I told Joe Romm and CAP, I am in the business of sharing ideas with people who I may have many disagreements with and interaction/exchange/discussion is a virtue in my world. Disagreement and conflict are to be expected. Malicious lying and bullying is not.

Robert Reich on Civility in Politics

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Thu, 10 May 2012 21:10:00 +0000

Sports Governance Interlude

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Thu, 10 May 2012 16:01:00 +0000

Please visit my sports blog -- The Least Thing -- where I have a two part article (with original reporting) that tells the tragic story of Mario Goijman, and the personal consequences to one man of failures in international sport governance.

The Tragedy of Mario Goijman: Part I and Part II.

Thanks!

Joe Romm is a Liar

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Thu, 10 May 2012 00:02:00 +0000

FINAL UPDATE 5/10: After what must be a dozen updates and corrections, Joe Romm's post is an incoherent mess (not that that distinguishes it from his normal fare;-). I wrote to CAP pointing out obvious untruths and the results were unannounced, quiet changes to Romm's post, plus a misleading response from CAP that they "stand by" their reporting. If anyone wants to know why American political discourse is so vitriolic, just look at both Heartland and CAP, two sides of the same coin.

UPDATE: Joe Romm obviously understands that he went way over the line on this one, as he has retitled his post and added some confusing words of update. He maintains his assertion that I have some sort of "official" relationship with Heartland, writing, "How anyone could guess this isn’t official is, well, Pielke-esque." Sorry, Joe, but that is still a lie.

Sorry to say it so bluntly, but it is true. Joe Romm has falsely claimed that I am an "official expert for Heartland." This is a lie. I have absolutely no relationship with Heartland -- never have, never will. Period.

Romm's efforts to smear by association are ironic given the lashing that Heartland just got for doing exactly the same thing. But irony has never registered high on Joe's awareness-meter. There is no lower form of "debate" than trying to sully someone's character by outright lying. And it is not the first time Joe has lied about me.

Joe Romm and the Center for American Progress should be ashamed of themselves for engaging in such tactics. Can't they engage a policy debate on its merits? Apparently not.

Sarewitz on Bias in Science

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 09 May 2012 21:16:00 +0000

In the current issue of Nature, Dan Sarewitz has a column about the threat posed by bias to scientific research. (The image above is a screenshot of a paper cited by Sarewitz, which is by J. Ioannidis, 2005, "Why Most Published Research Findings are False").

Sarewitz explains the systemic findings of bias in clinical trials as follows:

Like a magnetic field that pulls iron filings into alignment, a powerful cultural belief is aligning multiple sources of scientific bias in the same direction. The belief is that progress in science means the continual production of positive findings. All involved benefit from positive results, and from the appearance of progress. Scientists are rewarded both intellectually and professionally, science administrators are empowered and the public desire for a better world is answered. The lack of incentives to report negative results, replicate experiments or recognize inconsistencies, ambiguities and uncertainties is widely appreciated — but the necessary cultural change is incredibly difficult to achieve.

Why are such findings of bias turning up in clinical trials?

A biased scientific result is no different from a useless one. Neither can be turned into a real-world application. So it is not surprising that the cracks in the edifice are showing up first in the biomedical realm, because research results are constantly put to the practical test of improving human health. Nor is it surprising, even if it is painfully ironic, that some of the most troubling research to document these problems has come from industry, precisely because industry’s profits depend on the results of basic biomedical science to help guide drug-development choices.

Is the problem of bias limited to clinical studies?

It would therefore be naive to believe that systematic error is a problem for biomedicine alone. It is likely to be prevalent in any field that seeks to predict the behaviour of complex systems — economics, ecology, environmental science, epidemiology and so on. The cracks will be there, they are just harder to spot because it is harder to test research results through direct technological applications (such as drugs) and straightforward indicators of desired outcomes (such as reduced morbidity and mortality).

Read the whole thing here.

Ignore the Gloss at Some Risk

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Mon, 07 May 2012 13:41:00 +0000

Writing in the NYT yesterday, Jack Hitt discusses what Jerry Ravetz would call the "extended peer community" in the evaluation of knowledge claims. In the process Hitt produces a concise description of why blogging and other forms of commentary are vitally important:

These days, the comments section of any engaging article is almost as necessary a read as the piece itself — if you want to know how insider experts received the article and how those outsiders processed the news (and maybe to enjoy some nasty snark from the trolls).

Should this part of every contemporary article be curated and edited, almost like the piece itself? Should it have a name? Should it be formally linked to the original article or summarized at the top? By now, readers understand that the definitive “copy” of any article is no longer the one on paper but the online copy, precisely because it’s the version that’s been read and mauled and annotated by readers. (If a book isn’t read until it’s written in — as I was always told — then maybe an article is not published until it’s been commented upon.) Writers know this already. The print edition of any article is little more than a trophy version, the equivalent of a diploma or certificate of merit — suitable for framing, not much else.

We call the fallout to any article the “comments,” but since they are often filled with solid arguments, smart corrections and new facts, the thing needs a nobler name. Maybe “gloss.” In the Middle Ages, students often wrote notes in the margins of well-regarded manuscripts. These glosses, along with other forms of marginalia, took on a life of their own, becoming their own form of knowledge, as important as, say, midrash is to Jewish scriptures. The best glosses were compiled into, of course, glossaries and later published — serving as some of the very first dictionaries in Europe.

Hitt uses the case of the ivory billed woodpecker to explain that authoritative knowledge claims are often subject to scrutiny from those with knowledge and expertise outside the academy. The ivory billed woodpecker was thought to have been seen in a video in 2004 -- the first sighting in more than 50 years. The sighting was subsequently written up and published in Science. It turns out that the sighting was false, it was not an ivory billed woodpecker. The paper in Science however stands uncorrected.

This has resulted in a situation where the authoritative claims are widely known to be incorrect but not recognized as such. Hitt writes:

Already, among scientists, there is pushback, fear that incorporating critiques outside of professional peer review will open the floodgates to cranks. Not necessarily. The popular rejection last year of the discovery of a microbe that can live on arsenic was mercifully swift precisely because it was executed by online outsiders. Not acknowledging that crowd-checking and amateur commentary have created a different world poses its own dangers.

Take the case of the ivory-bill. The article in Science has never been retracted. Cornell still stands by its video. The federal Fish and Wildlife Service acted as though the ivory-bill existed, and, in 2008, it asked for $27 million to support recovery efforts. Here’s the thing: The ivory-billed woodpecker is the Schrödinger’s cat of contemporary media — dead to those who’ve looked inside Tom Nelson’s blog but alive to the professionals who can’t bear to.

Some may fear that recognizing the commentary of every article will turn every subject into an endless postmodern discussion. But actually, the opposite is true. Recognizing the gloss allows us to pause in the seemingly unending back and forth of contemporary free speech and free inquiry to say, well, for now, this much is true — the ivory-bill still hasn’t been definitively seen since World War II, climate change is happening and caused by mankind, natural selection is the best description of nature’s creative force. Et cetera.

It seems that the greatest challenge associated with blogging and other forms of "gloss" is not one of knowledge claims but of the accountability of authoritative institutions.

For instance, various claims made by the IPCC and US government as related to disasters and climate change are widely known to be false and Steve McIntyre has thoroughly documented many instances of questionable scientific practices in the so-called hockey stick literature. In both cases the relevant institutions have so far decided that it is easier to ignore the gloss than to deal with its consequences. But anyone who is paying attention can see what is going on. There is no ivory billed woodpecker.

Hitt explains that such false knowledge serves instrumental purposes, again citing the case of the ivory billed woodpecker:

The weirdest part of the ivory-bill’s resurrection is that if you look back through the past four decades, it turns out the bird has come back to life many times before. The ivory-bill seems to rise like a phoenix at times of environmental anxiety. And each time the sighting has been debunked, and then afterward some great section of wilderness has been declared protected and everyone feels better for a while.

After a 1966 disputed sighting in Texas, 84,550 acres became the Big Thicket National Preserve. When the ivory-bill was sighted/not sighted in a South Carolina swamp in 1971, the outcome was the creation of Congaree National Park. Alex Sanders, who as a member of South Carolina’s House of Representatives fought to preserve the land, told me that when people ask him where the ivory-bill is, he says, “I don’t know where he is now, but I know where he was when we needed him.”

Nice line. But you have to wonder: if we’d cinched our sense of reality with just a bit more reason instead of mythology, maybe we’d still be seeing the ivory-bill for real.

Ignoring the gloss may serve the interests of short-term expediency, but the longer-term consequences may not be so welcomed, especially within those bodies whose assertion of authority rests in knowledge claims.

FA Cup Says Expect More Hurricane Damage this Year

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Sat, 05 May 2012 19:54:00 +0000

UPDATE: The predictive power of the FA Cup is more extensive that I have thought -- British elections. H/T Steve Cook.

In 2009 academic paper, I documented a little-known but remarkable relationship (here in PDF):

Upon seeing efforts to establish relationships between various climate variables and NATL hurricane activity one is tempted to quote John von Neumann who said of fitting relationships with various parameters, ‘with four parameters I can fit an elephant, and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk’ (as related in Dyson, 2004). Indeed, my own research shows a correlation of 0.33 between the total score in the UK Football Association’s (FA’s) annual Cup Championship game and the subsequent hurricane season’s damage, without even controlling for SSTs, ENSO or the Premier League tables. Years in which the FA Cup championship game has a total of three or more goals have an average of 1.8 landfalling hurricanes and USD11.7 billion in damage, whereas championships with a total of one or two goals have had an average of only 1.3 storms and USD6.7 billion in damage.

Based on this relationship and the results of today's FA Cup final, we can expect an above-average damage year for hurricanes in the United States. Scoff at this, you may ... but it as as good a predictor (if not better) than any other. Let's plan on looking back in December and see how the FA Cup Hurricane Damage Prediction actually performed.

Caveat emptor.

Reuters on Tax Incentives for Manufacturing

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Thu, 03 May 2012 14:35:00 +0000

A very well-done piece from Reuters on the perverse incentives created by special tax breaks for a poorly defined segment of the economy - manufacturing.

H/T @gregmankiwblog.

UPDATE: On this very theme, at The Atlantic Derek Thompson has a neat piece on Big Macs and the global economy. Here is an excerpt:

McDonald's is a restaurant, but it functions much like a factory. Labor is supported by a deep well of technological innovation, such as vacuum packing, exceptional preservatives, deep freezing, vibrant artificial flavors, and high-speed microwaves. Workers assemble specific parts at great speed to deliver dependable and replicable products. "[McDonald's doesn't] put something on the menu until it can be produced at the speed of McDonald's," CEO James Skinner said in 2010, sounding not unlike Henry Ford from a century earlier.

Thompson's essay draws upon research in this paper on wages in the global economy.

Le Débat 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Thu, 03 May 2012 04:29:00 +0000

I have a soft spot for democracy in all of its flavors. Above is a report on the debate between Nicolas Sarkozy and François Hollande last night. Hollande leads in the polls and a victory later this week will shake up European politics significantly.

Here are the latest polling results, courtesy of the WSJ:

New Paper: Energiewende and Nichtwissen

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 02 May 2012 15:26:00 +0000

I have a new paper coming out in the journal Nature and Culture titled "Post-Normal Science in a German Landscape." The paper is about energy transitions and ignorance, viewed through the lens of brown coal and new lakes created from open pit mines in eastern Germany, near Leipzig (see video above). The paper was motivated by a workshop held a year ago at the University of Hamburg on the work of Jerry Ravetz and the notion of post-normal science.

Here is the abstract:

Post-Normal Science in a German Landscape

This essay explores the management and creation of ignorance via an exploration of the landscape of eastern Germany, which has seen profound social, political, and technological changes over the past several decades. Like in many places around the world decision makers in eastern Germany are seeking to reach a future state where seemingly conflicting outcomes related to the economy and the environment are simultaneously realized. The management of ignorance is an important but often overlooked consideration in decision making that the concept of “post-normal science” places into our focus of attention.

It is a bit more conceptual and philosophical than much of my normal fare, but still grounded in real-world policy. It was a fun paper to write, and I learned a lot.

It will be online soon, but if you'd like an advance copy, just send me an email rpielkejr@gmail.com

The NYT Puts the Hit On

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Tue, 01 May 2012 23:14:00 +0000

UPDATE 5/3: At Dot Earth Andy Revkin has this to say about the article discussed in this post:

The Lindzen focus is a distraction, to my mind. Anyone thinking that the erosion of Lindzen’s credibility will somehow build societal enthusiasm for cutting greenhouse gas emissions is probably overly optimistic.

Spot on.

The New York Times has an article today ostensibly about clouds but which is really an extended hit piece on Richard Lindzen, a professor at MIT, member of the US National Academy of Sciences and well known climate skeptic.

Below I have excerpted a laundry list of phrases in the article used to describe Lindzen:

Leading proponent of the view that clouds will save the day
Has drawn withering criticism
Errors in his papers
Proof is lacking
Obliged [politicians] by assuring them that they are running no risks by refusing to enact emissions limits
Contrarian scientist
Gone beyond any reasonable reading of the evidence to provide a dangerous alibi for inaction
Wrong science
[Not] intellectually honest at all
Contrarian scientist
Methods he had used to analyze data were flawed
His theory made assumptions that were inconsistent with known facts
Most mainstream researchers consider Dr. Lindzen’s theory discredited
He routinely misrepresents the work of other researchers
Dr. Lindzen offers little hint of how thin the published science supporting his position is
He makes what many colleagues see as an unwarranted leap of logic
Deeply unprofessional and irresponsible

This is "advocacy journalism" -- it is not reporting, as there is absolutely no news in the piece. Two years ago the Boston Globe did a very similar story on Lindzen for its Lifestyle section, which covered the same ground, but as a profile rather than as hit job.

Whatever one thinks about the climate change debate or Richard Lindzen, is it a good idea for the New York Times to engage in an over-the-top attack on a member of the National Academy of Sciences? Journalists, what do you think?

A Primer on the French Election

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Tue, 01 May 2012 16:26:00 +0000

More on Levelized Tuition

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:45:00 +0000

Writing in the Boulder Daily Camera, Bob Greenlee, a local columnist, finds the idea of a levelized tuition model appealing:

All state universities are proud icons representing the faith, hope, and future economic health of local taxpayers whose funds make state institutions possible. The level of state funding in Colorado has declined over the years to the extent that one can question whether or not CU is state supported or merely state named. The declining level of financial support may not be keeping pace with the growing needs of this important institution that is relying more on tuition hikes to keep the lights on and retain the talent required to maintain basic academic standards. For both parents and students the rising tuition costs are becoming a burden with studies indicating the amount of debt carried by students who mortgage their future exceeds the total amount of all credit card debt held by American consumers.

A number of intriguing observations about these issues have emerged from Roger Pielke, Jr., professor of environmental studies at CU-Boulder. Last year Pielke wrote an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education attempting to gain support for completely revamping how tuition is charged. Tuition for in-state CU students currently runs around $7,700 a year. Out-of-staters pay nearly four times as much. Pielke notes the financial viability of CU depends on "securing a large proportion of non-residents (that) creates incentives to favor their admission." He notes that two-thirds of all tuition income comes from a third of those attending the university and questions why there should be a distinction because the economic benefits that accrue for someone obtaining a college education are universal. Perhaps, he argues, a flat tuition of around $14,000 should apply to everyone and rather than state higher education funds going directly to the university he proposes Colorado should provide a direct subsidy to resident students.

I'm glad that he put that last bit in. The notion of a levelized tuition does not mean eliminating the state subsidy for in-state students. Nor is it about increasing tuition. It is about adopting a model for financing a state flagship university that aligns incentives with costs, and works to elevate quality of instruction, facilities, faculty and students.

For those wanting a bit more background, here is a link to my original essay in the Chronicle of Higher Education. I also discussed this proposal on this blog here and here and here and here and here and here.

Reader Mail: Win Some, Lose Some

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Sat, 28 Apr 2012 14:03:00 +0000

I received the thoughtful comment below from a reader down under about my ANU talk on The Climate Fix. At almost the exact came time, I received an email from another reader who explained that he recommended the talk to two atmospheric scientists at a US state department of environmental protection, who refused to watch it because I do not "acknowledge atmospheric science data" -- whatever that means;-) As a policy scholar you quickly learn that some people are willing to engage and others are not (and it can be surprising who falls into which category). Win some, lose some!

Reader mail

Thank you for this lecture, it’s a breath of fresh air in what I feel is an increasingly putrid political atmosphere with regards to climate change in Australia (no lame puns intended).

For example, just a few days ago, the ABC here devoted 2 hours of airtime (a 1 hour documentary followed by a 1 hour talk show discussion) to a tiresome ‘debate’ between a climate-believer and climate-sceptic (called “Can I change your mind about climate?” http://www.abc.net.au/tv/changeyourmind/), with all of the predictable and useless shenanigans resulting. Thankfully, your lecture undermines the pure silliness of such a question in the space of a few seconds. If only all of the people who wasted those 2 hours could’ve watched your 1 hour lecture instead!

Your refreshingly straightforward use of measuring sticks got me thinking about how the issue of decarbonising the economy is communicated by some people in Australia. It occurred to me that there may well be people smart enough to comprehend the enormous engineering scale of the challenge, but have found clever ways to disguise its magnitude by saying, for example, that Australia could decarbonise its economy by simply building a big 50km x 50km solar panel. Considering the enormous arid, sunny expanses of Australia, this figure can actually come across as underwhelming (!), as mentioned in this government report by ABARES (the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics) – http://adl.brs.gov.au/data/warehouse/pe_aera_d9aae_002/aeraCh_10.pdf (part 10.3.1, page 268), and in this presentation by a Melbourne urban planner, Rob Adams, who is talking about future energy use in Australia (though he misquotes the 50km x 50km, i.e. 2500 sq. km figure as 50 sq. km) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYJpdH-VGwc (15:44 in).

I did some simple maths from your presentation, which I think produces a comparable figure to the one mentioned in the ABARES report and Adams' presentation (assuming that each Cloncurry solar farm is roughly a hectare, 100m x 100m, in area – though this may well be an underestimate):

25% decarbonisation = 50 776 solar farms

100% decarbonisation = 203 104 solar farms = 450 x 450 solar farms approx.

(450 solar farms x 100m) x (450 solar farms x 100m) = 45km x 45km (rounded up to 50km x 50km)

Undoubtedly, it is more appealing to say that Australia’s carbon-free future lies in building one big 50km x 50km solar panel somewhere in the middle of the desert, rather than saying that Australia’s carbon-free future lies in building more than 200 000 solar farms. This is similar to the example you give of the hard imagery of dozens of nuclear plants versus the soft imagery of clean, green initiatives in the UK – a case of same difference.

Do you think this communication barrier can ever be overcome, when it seems that communicators themselves have figured out ways to massage the use of measuring sticks to make their messages more palatable? Or are we doomed to be stuck in a situation where hard, objective realities are obfuscated by people projecting their own mentally pleasing imagery onto them? I think it's a fascinating question that goes to the heart of the efficacy of political communication.

Questionable Research Practices: The "Steroids of Scientific Competition"

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 16:31:00 +0000

A new research paper just out in the journal Psychological Science by John et al. seeks to quantify the incidence of what are called "questionable research practices" in psychological research. They write:

Although cases of overt scientific misconduct have received significant media attention recently (Altman, 2006; Deer, 2011; Steneck, 2002, 2006), exploitation of the gray area of acceptable practice is certainly much more prevalent, and may be more damaging to the academic enterprise in the long run, than outright fraud. Questionable research practices (QRPs), such as excluding data points on the basis of post hoc criteria, can spuriously increase the likelihood of finding evidence in support of a hypothesis. Just how dramatic these effects can be was demonstrated by Simmons, Nelson, and Simonsohn (2011) in a series of experiments and simulations that showed how greatly QRPs increase the likelihood of finding support for a false hypothesis. QRPs are the steroids of scientific competition, artificially enhancing performance and producing a kind of arms race in which researchers who strictly play by the rules are at a competitive disadvantage. QRPs, by nature of the very fact that they are often questionable as opposed to blatantly improper, also offer considerable latitude for rationalization and self-deception.

John et al. used multiple methods to assess the prevalence of questionable research practices among psychology researchers. They found a surprising high prevalence of such practices in their study.

They note that some questionable research practices are indeed, questionable, but that the researchers surveyed also found many of the practices to be unjustifiable:

As noted in the introduction, there is a large gray area of acceptable practices. Although falsifying data (Item 10 in our study) is never justified, the same cannot be said for all of the items on our survey; for example, failing to report all of a study’s dependent measures (Item 1) could be appropriate if two measures of the same construct show the same significant pattern of results but cannot be easily combined into one measure. Therefore, not all self-admissions represent scientific felonies, or even misdemeanors; some respondents provided perfectly defensible reasons for engaging in the behaviors. Yet other respondents provided justifications that, although self categorized as defensible, were contentious (e.g., dropping dependent measures inconsistent with the hypothesis because doing so enabled a more coherent story to be told and thus increased the likelihood of publication). It is worth noting, however, that in the follow-up survey—in which participants rated the behaviors regardless of personal engagement—the defensibility ratings were low. This suggests that the general sentiment is that these behaviors are unjustifiable.

Even so, there are incentives in the research world to engage in questionable research practices:

We assume that the vast majority of researchers are sincerely motivated to conduct sound scientific research. Furthermore, most of the respondents in our study believed in the integrity of their own research and judged practices they had engaged in to be acceptable. However, given publication pressures and professional ambitions, the inherent ambiguity of the defensibility of “questionable” research practices, and the well-documented ubiquity of motivated reasoning (Kunda, 1990), researchers may not be in the best position to judge the defensibility of their own behavior. This could in part explain why the most egregious practices in our survey (e.g., falsifying data) appear to be less common than the relatively less questionable ones (e.g., failing to report all of a study’s conditions). It is easier to generate a post hoc explanation to justify removing nuisance data points than it is to justify outright data falsification, even though both practices produce similar consequences.

The authors suggest that the prevalence of questionable research practices may help to explain the finding the many studies cannot be replicated:

QRPs can waste researchers’ time and stall scientific progress, as researchers fruitlessly pursue extensions of effects that are not real and hence cannot be replicated. More generally, the prevalence of QRPs raises questions about the credibility of research findings and threatens research integrity by producing unrealistically elegant results that may be difficult to match without engaging in such practices oneself. This can lead to a “race to the bottom,” with questionable research begetting even more questionable research. If reforms would effectively reduce the prevalence of QRPs, they not only would bolster scientific integrity but also could reduce the pressure on researchers to produce unrealistically elegant results.

I think I am on safe ground when I say that the problem of questionable research practices goes well beyond the discipline of psychology.

Pushing Back on Extreme Nonsense

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 23:12:00 +0000

UPDATE 4/25: Mike Wallace sends the following comment in by email:

The quote from my article shouldn't be interpreted as indicating that I'm not concerned about human-induced global warming. To put it in perspective, please read on. You can find the entire article on the LA Times web site.

Please do read the whole thing, Mass' also.

Cliff Mass and Mike Wallace at the University of Washington have expressed some thoughts on the hype associated with climate change and extreme events.

Mass writes on his blog:

It is happening frequently lately. A major weather event occurs---perhaps a hurricane, heat wave, tornado outbreak, drought or snowstorm-- and a chorus of activist groups or media folks either imply or explicitly suggest that the event is the result of human-caused (anthropogenic) global warming. Perhaps the worst offender is the organization www.350.org and their spokesman Bill McKibben. Close behind is Climate Central, which even has an extreme weather/climate blog. The media has noted many times that the U.S. in 2011 experienced a record 14 billion-dollar weather disasters--and many of the articles imply or suggest a connection with human-forced global warming. Even the NY Times has jumped into the fray recently, giving front-page coverage of an unscientific survey that found that a large majority of Americans believe recent extreme weather events are the result of anthropogenic global warming. One does not have to wonder very hard about where Americans are getting their opinions--and it is not from the scientific community.

He explains:

It is somewhat embarrassing for me to admit this, but part of the problem is that a small minority of my colleagues--people who should know better-- are feeding the extreme-weather/climate hype in the mistaken belief that by doing so they can encourage people to do the right thing--lessen their carbon footprint.

Writing in the LA Times yesterday, Mike Wallace takes issue with the cavalier linkage of the March heat wave to human-caused climate change, reminding us that climate is complex:

The cause of last month's strange weather was an extraordinarily large and persistent meander of the jet stream that swept tropical air, with temperatures reaching into the 80s as far north as southern Canada.

Likening today's climate system to a muscle-bound, drugged athlete performing feats far beyond the capabilities of straight athletes would be appropriate if the extreme and persistent distortions of the jet stream we saw in March could be demonstrated to have been caused by global warming.

But let's remember where the burden of proof lies. In the world of sports, when an athlete is accused of relying on performance-enhancing drugs, it is the prosecutor who must prove the case. The same should apply to claims that the behavior of the jet stream is being profoundly altered by global warming. Thus far, such assertions are not well supported by scientific evidence.

In the absence of proof that the jet stream's variability is human-induced, we must consider the possibility that the apparent weirdness of the weather in March isn't all that weird if viewed in a larger historical context. In this respect, it's noteworthy that large areas of the U.S. were just about as warm in March 1910 as they were in March 2012. With weather, weird things happen every now and again.

Fortunately, the flora and fauna and the human inhabitants of temperate latitudes are accustomed to dealing with huge swings in wintertime temperatures, and so most of the effects of March Madness will be short-lived.

Over the long term I have every confidence that scientific questions will be resolved using the tools of science. In the meantime, it sure is nice to see these prominent scientists standing up for the integrity of their field, even if it means sticking their necks out and risking criticism from a few overly enthusiastic scientists and reporters.

Quote of the Day

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 12:06:00 +0000

Courtesy John Kay:

“How convenient it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to make or find a reason for whatever one has a mind to do.”

Benjamin Franklin

German Mittelstand: One of a Kind?

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 07:45:00 +0000

Above is feature from The Economist on Germany's Mittelstand manufacturing companies. It accompanies a valuable briefing on Germany's economy. Here is an excerpt:

Many Mittelstand firms are oligopolists, argues Mr Schmiedeberg, occupying niches so narrow that they attract few rivals. Increasingly, the niches are being defended with services, in this context not the term of derision it often is in manufacturing circles. Beckhoff builds its own sales and maintenance networks, relying little on dealers—unlike some of its non-German competitors.

The next stage is “hybrid value-added”, in which the product is an outcome that the customer wants rather than the good that produces it. Wolf Heiztechnik of Bavaria is developing a contract under which it sells temperature control rather than heating equipment. “Every Chinese firm can do the industrial part, not the whole hybrid,” says Karl Lichtblau of IW Consult, a consultancy. Counting industry-related services, he reckons, manufacturing’s share of GDP is more like 30% than 20%.

The German experience, The Economist argues, may not be exportable. The whole briefing is worth a read.

The Climate Fix Lecture - With Slides

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 12:45:00 +0000

Thanks to a very helpful reader (Thanks Richard!) and the ANU Crawford School, the video of my recent lecture in Canberra now has the powerpoint slides integrated. It is above, Enjoy!

Who Cares What the Science Says?

noreply@blogger.com (Roger Pielke, Jr.) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 12:33:00 +0000

The latest NYT story on extremes and climate change celebrates the fact that many Americans fail to understand how human-caused climate change may be related to recent extreme events. Today's NYT reports a new poll that indicates that a large portion of the public believes that specific, recent events can be attributed to greenhouse gas emissions.

Yet, rather than citing recent research on the topic -- such as the IPCC SREX report -- the NYT decides to cheer about the public misunderstanding and speculate on its possible political usefulness:

Read together, the polls suggest that direct experience of erratic weather may be convincing some people that the problem is no longer just a vague and distant threat.

Ends justify the means -- This reminds me of Dick Cheney's comments about connections between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. It is the political outcome that matters, no?

The poll reported by the NYT actually reports nothing new, the public has for a long time (decades and centuries, actually, see Stehr and von Storch, PDF) believed that the human impact on weather is much greater than the science shows.

Here is an excerpt from The Climate Fix where I discuss this very issue:

In some respects, the campaign to convince people that climate change is a threat may have been too successful, such that people have come to believe things that the science cannot support. For instance, a 2007 New York Times/CBS Poll found that of the three- quarters of people who believed that weather over the past few years had been stranger than normal, 43 percent attributed that weather to “global warming” and a further 15 percent to “pollution/damage to the environment.” Yet, as most scientists will explain, weather events and even climate patterns over a period of years simply cannot be attributed to greenhouse gas emissions. Detecting changes in climate requires decades of observations. A very cold winter or two does not disprove a decades-long warming trend, and a series of damaging hurricanes is not evidence of a human influence.

Some advocates, including some scientists, seek to have things both ways when they assert that a particular weather event is “consistent with” predictions of human-caused climate change. The snowy period of early 2010 along the U.S. East Ccoast saw those opposed to action suggesting that the record snow and cold cast doubt on the science of human-caused climate change, while at the same time those calling for action explained that the weather was “consistent with” the forecasts from climate models. Both lines of argument were misleading. Any and all weather is “consistent with” predictions from climate models under a human influence on the climate system. Similarly, any and all weather is also “consistent with” failing predictions of long-term climate change. Simply put, weather is not climate. Given the degree of politicization of the climate debate, we should not be surprised that even the weather gets politicized.

By the same token, it should come as no surprise that many in the public hold views about climate science that are way out in front of the scientific consensus on climate change as represented by the reports of the IPCC. The result is that when people learn what the science actually says, there is a risk that they will learn that their views are in fact incompatible with what the science can support, leading to a belief that the science has been overstated in public debate.