Nathan Scandella (personal)

Climate Change Mythbusting (Part II)

Another common refrain in the climate change skepticism camp is that scientists themselves are divided, and that there are lots of scientists, some of them very-well respected, who do not subscribe to the idea that climate change is occurring, or that its causes are primarily related to human activity. I have already addressed the issue of the consensus among climate scientists. However, there seem to be larger numbers of skeptics in the other sciences.

Take, for example, Freeman Dyson, the world-renowned physicist, originally from England. He has been well publicized as a skeptic. An article in the NY Times this year focused heavily on Dyson as a thorn in the side of the environmental movement. Dyson spoke recently on Charlie Rose, and addressed this very issue. Here, he stressed a number of things, including:

• he is not an expert (his words) in this field


• he acknowledges the general trend of warming


• he does not know (his words, again) what is responsible for global temperature increases


• he acknowledges that sea levels are rising


• articles such as the one in the NY Times have exaggerated his position


• his primary contention with the climate science consensus is regarding the role that humans have played in the changes

I'd like to address his concerns in a couple different ways. First of all, whenever analyzing opinions - and that is clearly what Dyson is expressing, not the reduction of an extensive analysis that he has done on the topic - it is critical to consider the source. As I mentioned, Dyson is not a climate scientist. Perhaps the general public doesn't understand science well enough, but a background in one discipline does not mean you have all the answers in all disciplines. For example, Linus Pauling was a brilliant chemist, but he hurt his reputation by venturing into Nutrition and recommending levels of Vitamin C we now know to be harmful. Of course, I don't have a climate science background either. But, I would not suggest that people believe that anthropogenic global warming is happening because I say so ... rather, that they do because of the data that climate scientists have presented.

Secondly, let's look at who Dyson is, in addition to what he is not. He is a former citizen of the UK, in his eighties, and a Christian. While climate change is likely to bring harmful consequences for many around the world, some may make out better than others. I'd hazard a guess that the English, with whom it seems likely Dyson would sympathize, will be amongst the better-off. For one, we know the climate there is currently anything but warm. Secondly, as opposed to other cooler climates that depend on local mountain ranges for storage of drinking water, England has little in the way of mountain snowpack. Princeton, New Jersey is the same way. Unlike Seattle, they are not poised to suffer directly from the loss of glacial ice and mountain snow. Of course, I do live in Seattle, and perhaps I'm overly concerned because my region may be one of the ones adversely affected by rising temperatures. Quite possible. But, virtually no one believes in the climate change theory because Nathan Scandella says what he does. That's not true for Freeman Dyson's relationship to the skeptics, so this point is important.

My previous post on scientific polling showed that scientists in certain disciplines aligned with the fossil fuel industry, have vastly more empathy for the climate change skeptics. What about certain countries? Would you really expect the Saudis to lead the way to renewable energy? Many Americans don't know that in our lifetimes, England has become a major player in the oil industry. For about 25 years, ending only very recently, England has been a net exporter of oil. Even now that they've gone slightly into the role of importer again, they get nearly all their oil from nearby Norway. Very little of their oil comes from the Middle East, or Venezuela. Another major reason to wean ourselves off oil is the geo-political reality of dependence on unfriendly regimes. But, for England, that's not a problem that's very real right now. Once again, consider the source.

In the Rose interview, Dyson speaks glowingly of traveling to Greenland, and seeing the changes in temperature benefitting the local population. I don't doubt that for a minute, but I think his analysis may be colored by personal anecdotal experience. It's wonderful that Greenland may also see benefits from rising temperatures, but very few of the earth's 6+ billion people live in Greenland, and the average living conditions are very different.

Additionally, as I mentioned, Dyson is in his eighties. I would concur that the severe effects of climate change are not likely to take effect in his lifetime. Thus, for him, this problem may be completely abstract. For me, it is decidedly not. And I happen to be very close to the world's average human, in age. Dyson is not. Age is an issue in another way. It's certainly not politically correct to mention this, but I think we have a rather large problem coming to grips with the effects of aging on our ability to reason. No one wants to admit it, because all of us are aging, and actually, most of the world is over the age when the brain ceases to "grow" in a meaningful way. Of course, knowledge can continue to be added throughout a person's life, but this problem is not one of knowledge accumulation. There is no known "answer" to this problem. In effect, we are extrapolating to project the long-term effects of climate change. This is a difficult problem, and I believe the analysis draws more on the ability to reason and intuit than to simply regurgitate acquired knowledge. A framework for solving climate problems is thus a necessary, but not necessarily sufficient condition here. I'm personally suspect of a physicist in his eighties attempting to solve problems outside his area of expertise.

I'm sure this argument is offensive to many older people and younger (aging) people alike. But, that doesn't mean it's not valid. As the caregiver for a parent with advanced Alzheimer's disease, I've spent lots of time learning how the brain works, or doesn't work, during the progression of dementia. Am I suggesting that Dyson is demented? No, of course not. But what most people don't realize is that dementia is not a black and white condition, that you either have or you don't (like a specific viral infection). In essence, dementia is the acceleration of the brain's normal aging process. If we all live long enough, we'll all experience the symptoms. And contrary to popular opinion, dementia is not just about memory loss. It's also largely about the loss in ability to reason. This is harder to discern, as it's quite clear when someone has forgotten something (where are my keys?), but not as clear when their judgement fails in ways that it may not have, 20 years ago. So, I'm quite happy to put my wits up against Freeman Dyson's, in his eighties. Were he to be 34, that might be another story. But, that's not the story here.

We watched Ronald Reagan serve out his second term as President, in the early stages of Alzheimer's. I'd certainly consider that experience to be a stern warning against letting elderly men dictate policy for the rest of us. Alan Greenspan? The relics on the Supreme Court? Our cultural bias towards respecting the senior class can come at a high price when we're faced with something they have never before seen.

As far as his status as a Christian, I don't know what more I can say on this topic. I'm not particularly interested in letting someone who believes in God chastise other scientists for not adhering to the strictest definition of the scientific method, or for being intolerant of "heretic" thinkers.

If a man does not abide in me, he is cast forth as a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire and burned.

I'd personally rather let policy be guided by those who

• are verifiable experts in their fields


• are likely to live long enough to have to live with the consequences of their decisions


• do not have personal biases that can heavily influence their opinions

Next, I'd like to focus on the crux of Dyson's objections. He is justifiably concerned that the consensus is drawing conclusions without enough conclusive data. The problem is that with a problem like this, data takes a long time to obtain. Secondly, the nature of the problem is such that even after we begin to take strong action to fix the problem, the problem will continue to get worse for many years, as older technology is phased out. It is simply impossible to think that fossil fuels will be abandoned overnight, which is why we need to start weaning ourselves off them now. Dyson's objection seems to neglect this point. I personally would love to see more data, as would he, but we can't afford to do nothing (well, he can, for the aforementioned reasons) until we have 100% certainty that we know what the problem is. The IPCC has used statistical methods to assess their findings, and we have already crossed the 90% threshold for certainty that we are causing a global warming trend. That's not 100%, but I believe it's enough to warrant immediate action.

In this sense, Dyson is playing the role of the skeptical scientist. Normally, when presented with an academic problem, it is considered proper to wait until we have conclusive evidence before proclaiming scientific law. That's science at its best. However, we as a society don't always have the luxury of waiting for that. Most of Dyson's acclaim has come as a result of work in physics that, quite frankly, isn't critically important to today's problems. So, in those cases, it's completely appropriate for him to push for more analysis, until every possible objection can be addressed. In this case, we're not dealing with a purely academic issue.

What we have is partly academic issue, and partly strategic issue. Frankly, I see no reason why Dyson should even be at the table with respect to strategy. He's not a political scientist, not a policy maker, not renowned as a strategist. In fact, later in the Rose interview, he describes his feelings on nuclear weapons by saying that he believes we (the US) should move towards total nuclear disarmament. Total? Really? So, we won't even have a few spares in case Kim Jong-Il gets a little bolder than he currently is? I wonder how many conservatives, who flock to Dyson looking for scientific support for their environmental irresponsibility, would approve of his strategic position with respect to national defense? I'm not a conservative, and I don't even agree with it. Again, climate science is climate science, quantum physics is quantum physics, and strategy is strategy.

So, is the wishy-washy, "I don't know" testimony of Freeman Dyson really something we should be gambling the future of our planet's inhabitability on? Seems like bad strategy to me.

Posted at 11:49PM Aug 21, 2009 by Nathan in Environment  |  Comments[0]