Tobis, who I think is reachable, et al cling to the information deficit model out of fear that any diminishing of climate’s role in defining and directing action toward the real goal of energy transformation will prevent or delay that action. The deficit model appeals to those who hope for a grand solution. What we actually have is a focus deficit.
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The information deficit model leads to a tremendous waste of time, effort and money expended in an attempt to convince enough people to somehow influence politicians and governments to maybe impose a global solution that is nearly impossible to attain and is unlikely to be effective if it were.

Keith writes: “No, in reality, it seems more a struggle to reconcile climate science with competing values.”

I think you have revealed the problem, not the solution. What is “climate science”? It appears that your statement applies to the IPCC version of it. The real scientific problem is reconciling that version with the evidence, instead of trying to find anything to support that predetermined conclusion (while insisting that all others must be wrong). Real science doesn’t need to be reconciled with cultural values until after the scientific evidence is clear. That is the next step. When it starts out that way it is Lysenkoism.

“I think some leading climate communicators, such as Gore, need to come to grips…”

Here’s where cultural values come in. The sooner the AGW movement dumps and silences Gore the better. He has become the symbol of everything wrong with this project and his association with it is now completely counterproductive. People tend to have a negative reaction to Gore’s kind of self-serving blowhard hypocrisy and that cannot be repaired. The AGW project needs to clean house of all the reminders of how low this project can go, and start fresh.

This was designed to be a culture war but as this study demonstrates, our culture does not consist of a dumb flock easily herded by supposed scientific authorities, let alone Gore Messiah types. This war has run aground on the intelligence of the public.

And this was all made possible by the internet which enabled this discussion to get past the MSM propaganda machine. It appears that the old media is the one place where the AGW project found the flock of eager dupes that it was hoping everyone was.

Keith, well, thanks for the shout-out. I will duly stand by what you are calling the “deficit model”.
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I think you are falling into the same trap Nisbet does, confusing “information deficit” with “belief or disbelief in global warming” or some such question.
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First, most people, including politicians and journalists, still don’t understand how compelling the case is, or how completely carbon emissions must be eliminated. Even if concern becomes nearly unanimous, some understanding of what the real options are is necessary.
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Second, there are all the Lucias out there, people who would like to investigate and understand on their own terms. Should such people be welcomed and treated with respect, or not? Leaving aside the issue of reciprocity, I think the former. There is a wide spectrum of curiosity about these matters. That interest will only increase, and should do so, as climate matters increasingly dominate our lives, which they probably will.
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The relationship between the amateur and professional climatology community is turning out to be astonishingly important not just in the history of science but quite likely in the history of civilization. The ersatz experts like Watts and the fake scandals and all that are partially rooted in a deliberate campaign of obfuscation, no doubt. But there is also genuine interest that is stymied by a perceived cloister mentality in the field that is part intrinsic, part invoked, and part imagined. This is important in that it gives the Inhofes of the world additional cover.
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Our problems are generally exacerbated by bad communication between science and the public, and generally can be ameliorated by better communication between science and the public.
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It isn’t about selling soap. It isn’t about convincing people of factoids. That’s just politics as usual, Procter and Gamble style soap sales.
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It’s a matter of being able to choose between several plausible pathways and a whole slew of bad ones. That requires reason, which requires a critical mass of people representing all constituencies who are informed and reasonable.
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So I stand by my position, which is that the more the state of science is made accessible and is understood, the more likely a reasonable outcome becomes; that science communication, while not sufficient to close a political deal, is necessary to close a useful one. Not only that, but I find it astonishing that I am being challenged to defend this. It seems pretty much central to the way the world is put together.
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I have never said that values are not involved. I don’t believe anybody has. So I don’t especially disagree with the Yale quote, and don’t see how it is “exactly backwards” from anything I have said. I simply claim that public understanding of the issue is currently inadequate to support an informed policy. By which I mean, perhaps a couple of dozen hours of exposure to the various key features at a high school level, or the equivalent in the press.
 

Occam’s Razor suggests that the reason more knowledge results in less confidence in climate science is that:
1. The science is WEAK
and/or
2. The science has been OVERSTATED
I think any honest assessment of the results has to bring this up as a possibility.  The fact that this possibility is not even enumerated (and then dismissed) shows clearly a fundamental insecurity of advocates.
�
 

I suppose Dr. Tobis’ newfound willingness to accept Lucia into the realms of polite society means we can accept an apology for some of the things he has written about her.
 

Keith, i did a post on Kahan et al. last week
http://judithcurry.com/2011/06/28/mooney-on-kahan-on-skeptics/
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including a link to a comment from Nullius in Verba from a previous thread at c-a-c.

@7, Tom Scharf, you say:
�
Occam’s Razor suggests that the reason more knowledge results in less confidence in climate science is that:
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You need to be careful.  The study doesn’t show more knowledge leads to less confidence.  The causality could be reversed.  It’s possible people with less confidence feel more motivated to do research.

As a layperson, I find it curious that climate scientists believe that the only thing they have to do is to communicate better and we shall believe them.

What ordinary people require from science to regard it credible is the ability to deliver. This is where climate science has failed.

If scientists say that Arctic will be soon ice-free, it better happen. If hurricanes are predicted to get worse after Katrina, they should. If 50 million climate refugees are predicted for 2010, they better be there. Sea levels should be on their way to rise 6 meters to save Al Gore’s face. Winters should get milder, not colder.

I know, these were not certainties, but they were trumpeted in the media as the next best thing to it. As predictions fail, doubts raise their head and alternative theories gain traction. Mix in politics and advocacy and the present cocktail is ready.

I think that what is missing from this discussion is the tremendous influx of lobbyist money that is being poured into the media and Congressional coffers to influence public opinion and Congressional action on climate change.  This influence of money on our politics and public opinion is what is undermining our entire democratic system, on all issues from economy to the environment.  Sound policy and information is being deliberately distorted.  The only way to counter it, as Tobias so convincingly advocate, is better education on public policy matters, and particularly in this case on science.

Michael Tobias writes:

“I am afraid it is too late for that. On the consensus opinion, things will get worse on the climate front no matter what we do. The question is only how much worse.”

And you scolded me for being so certain in my opinions.

Other than this alleged “consensus opinion,” what makes you so certain? Models?

And what exactly does “worse” mean? What? Where? Why?

Since you are so certain that things will get “worse” no matter what, why should we bother doing much at all?

And what is that “consensus opinion” today? Given all the new information it can’t still be the same – at least if it is based on objective scientific enquiry rather than blind faith.

But then, since this is and always has been a ‘culture war’ rather than an objective scientific project, I guess some things will never change… except, as always, the climate.

Richard:
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I don’t see it.  The CAGW consensus and the Gore “Truth” has been pushed hard by print, radio and television media since the late 1990′s.  The energy lobby is distorting a distortion, that’s how our system works.
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Keith:  The media is owned by the environmental lobby influence peddling. They scream bloody murder and mutter EXxon/Mobil whenever the media makes the slightest deviation from the consensus talking points.

“I am afraid it is too late for that. On the consensus opinion, things will get worse on the climate front no matter what we do. The question is only how much worse.”
…
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Other than this alleged “consensus opinion,” what makes you so certain?
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OK, I have my scientist hat on here. This comment is pretty my attempt to deliver the consensus position. My own opinions are not included.
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The time constant of removal of carbon from the combined atmosphere/ocean/biosphere system is very long, so long that the problem to first order is cumulative. Extra carbon does not go away when emissions cease. (This is an example of the sort of fact people don’t seem to understand.) So however much warming we get at peak stays with us for a long time (except if we undertake huge, expensive and risky geoengineering projects).
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To some extent it leaves the atmosphere and goes into the ocean making the climate problem slightly better and the ocean acidification problem slightly worse.
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In addition to this ratcheting effect, there are several delays, of which the most salient on the time scales people usually worry about are the thermal inertia of the upper ocean and the gradual melting of ice. This means that the warming we see at a given time is the warming committed to some decades earlier.
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Also, there is aerosol masking. Basically, dust pollution tends to go up with carbon use, especially in less developed countries. This contributes a non-uniform cooling which in the global average counteracts the warming, though the differences in spatial organization also contributes to regional climate change. So the upshot of that is that we only see a fraction of the warming we committed to some decades ago. If the pollution stops, the warming will quickly be unmasked.
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Finally, there are policy and economic delays in replacing massive infrastructure, meaning that the time between making a real decision to deal with the problem and actually implementing it is long and spread out over decades.
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Models?
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The word “model” is commonly misused in these discussions. All science is models. A thermometer is a model. The consensus is certainly informed by modern computers doing complex calculations. Climatologists see no reason we shouldn’t use the same tools that other sciences do.
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And what exactly does “worse” mean? What? Where? Why?
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Rapid changes in climate, increasing interannual variability, increases in some types of sever event, and rising sea levels, stressing both natural and human adaptation. Everywhere. Because of an increasingly modified radiative transfer balance.


Since you are so certain that things will get “worse” no matter what, why should we bother doing much at all?
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Because things could get much worse than they already are bound to get.
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And what is that “consensus opinion” today? Given all the new information it can’t still be the same ““ at least if it is based on objective scientific enquiry rather than blind faith.


Well, you can wait for IPCC AR5. For now, I’d just go with AR4. Nothing spectacular has changed in the balance of evidence.


Hope this helps.

I think there is no such thing as a “preference for government intrusion” for its own sake among liberals. It’s a silly notion. Liberals may not be biased against acknowledging a global collective problem, but they are not motivated in favor of it by a love of bureaucracy. What good would that do them or anybody else?
 

jeff! Look! Under the bed! It’s a windmill! Call Sancho!

@25
The problem is, when pursuing a happy socialist collective society with everyone in it for the common good, we have often ended up with this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Stalin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong
Given the choice between AGW in highly uncertain amounts or a likely socialist turned totalitarian society I freely choose warming.  History has not been kind to collective socialist societies.

Michael Tobis Says:
July 6th, 2011 at 6:58 pm
It’s like everything you say to these people gets translated through Monty Python’s Hungarian phrasebook, isn’t it?

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Or, in your case, the Henny Penny mantra

So a “thermometer is a model,” huh? I get a solid, disgusted kick out of this everything is a model nonsense one encounters from true-believers. 

A thermometer is *not* a model.  A GCM is a model, and a very poor one, because it has predicted nothing true.  The kind of “model” you’d want to compare it to is *The Standard Model.*

You see, The Standard Model makes lots and lots of testable predictions and they get verified by experiment.  A thermometer makes no such predictions. 

So perhaps we ought to be more careful dealing out spurious analogies.  And more circumspect when claiming that “complex” computer models “inform” climate science. 

The entire alarmist position, the whole Venus Syndrome schtick, relies *entirely* and *necessarily* upon extrapolations from climate model projections.  It is beyond ludicrous to take seriously this primitive code fantasia. 

I mentioned this on a previous thread but I’ll rephrase it here as it may have been o/t at the time.
A similar paper from a few months ago showed that the more apocalyptic the claims of AGW disaster the increased likelihood of skepticism. While the obvious explanation of this would be that with more sensational claims a rational increase in scrutiny is to expected (sensational claims require sensational evidence). The paper however explained it thusly:

““¦information about the potentially dire consequences of global warming threatens deeply held beliefs about the world as  just, and orderly, and basically fair . Individuals may overcome this threat by denying or discounting the existence of climate change and this may mean decreased willingness to act on climate change.”

This was in my estimation a fair analysis of a large portion of intuitively skeptical members of the climate debate. But as jeffn at 26 mentions, the ideological lenses of believers are not examined. I believe it would be equally fair to invert the quotation to depict intuitive “believers”:

“...information about the potentially dire consequences of global warming affirms deeply held beliefs about the world as unjust, and disorderly, and basically unfair . Individuals may reinforce this threat by denying or discounting evidence that contradicts climate change and this may mean increased willingness to act on climate change.”

Essentially what I’m getting at is that both sides approach the issue from intuitive moral standpoints and not just rationalized, objective interpretations of data. That only one side of the political spectrum is examined is probably due to the fact that social scientists are overwhelmingly liberal.

MT: “Rapid changes in climate, increasing interannual variability, increases in some types of sever event, and rising sea levels, stressing both natural and human adaptation. Everywhere. Because of an increasingly modified radiative transfer balance.”
Where has any of this (other than SL) been measured? Even the sea level rise is so small to be difficult to separate from natural rise.
“Basically, dust pollution tends to go up with carbon use, especially in less developed countries. This contributes a non-uniform cooling which in the global average counteracts the warming, though the differences in spatial organization also contributes to regional climate change. So the upshot of that is that we only see a fraction of the warming we committed to some decades ago.”
This is largely speculation. If it is true, many (including me) might be convinced by accurate and reliable measurements. I don’t see much advocacy of making this kind of measurement a very high priority (rather than spending money on posh conferences).

So thermometer plays music! Cool!

Jack, a thermometer is an instrument. Pay it forward.

Although this video does make a point. Maybe something can be two aspects of one terlimologies at once.  http://bit.ly/qAhyeS
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I need to consider this.

 If the public had more scientific education they would be much more aware that over a decade in which CO2 concentrations have risen at about 2ppm pa - there has been no warming at all. That would mean that even fewer people would believe in a high CO2 sensitivity.

 Be careful of what you wish for Tobis – you might get it.

and that apology to Lucia?

So, Keith, what I can I do besides try to provide the information? Say “is not is not is not”? Bill is either a perpetrator or a victim of cherry picking. The only reasonable thing to do is to point to the shape of the actual data and invoke Moynihan’s rule.
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Anyway, I already showed the temperature curve. Go look at it. I picked 2001-2011 because you said “the last decade” and for no other reason.
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Stipulated that 1998 was bizarre. Funny how many times I’ve heard “no warming since 1998″. Doubly funny to be accused of cherry picking for it.

Sea level rise:
http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/06/14/sea-level-rise-1/
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Sea ice volume:
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/wordpress/research/projects/arctic-sea-ice-volume-anomaly/
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Glacier volume:
http://www.wgms.ch/mbb/sum09.html
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Ice Sheet Volume:
http://thingsbreak.wordpress.com/2011/02/16/greenland-and-antarctic-ice-sheet-decay-update/
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It’s time for me to bow out as I am getting angry. Hopefully someone else will point out what is misleading about “At its current rate it would come in at around the bottom the IPCC’s predicted range for 2100.”
 

Well he has been living with BAU to date, so I suppose the answer is “Yes”? If not his alternatives are suicide, terrorism or both.

To elaborate on the answering randomly aspect, let us assume that those people, who know the answer, will always answer correctly and the others will pick their answer by random. If this (IMO reasonable) assumption holds true, this translates to only 44% of the population KNOWING that the Earth goes around the Sun and a mere 18% KNOWING that it takes the Earth a year to do so. Depressing.

“Differences in cultural values” or differences in schmultural values, it doesn’t matter one iota.  When the ‘solution’ to the ‘problem’ is beyond the ability of the people to correct, the solution and the problem mean nothing to those capable of doing the real, human, political math.  In other words, it ain’t gonna’ happen.

Example:  Everyone on the planet agrees that the end of the World is coming in 3 years and the only solution is to stop the rotation of the planet for 12 minutes before that day arrives and restart the rotation at the former speed 10 seconds after the 12th minute.  Result – World Ends.  Why?  Because the people of the World are incapable of arriving at a solution, and working together, to make the ‘fix’.  More than half will say it can’t be done.  The remainder will scream and shout that it must be done.  But it the end it won’t be done.

Now, take a simple little problem like CO2, or whatever you want.  It won’t be done.  Why?  Because the majority aren’t going to drop everything and go marching into the void of the Unknown and change Everything just because a few nut-cases with PhD’s in fingerpainting are pulling their hair out and screaming that the sky is falling.

Before screaming that everyone must do something about anything, consult a qualified psychologist for some good advice about how to do it right (and/or save yourself a lot of anxiety).  All “scientists” should be monitoring the AGW Battle to Save the World from Itself, they can learn a lot about what not to do and say should they ever need to save the World.

Perhaps at some point people will realize that this debate will not be settled on one set of criteria alone.
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The scientific process is one of considerable back and forth on the Greek model, with thesis, antithesis and eventual synthesis as the goal. Those profiting from cyclical swings and those watching from the sidelines have good seasons and bad.
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It’s been a tough season for the consensus side, made tougher by their own behaviour. But it’s just a season.

Tobis’ link to sea level rise is *very* interesting.  It’s very interesting b/c what’s presented there is so laughably convoluted.  And yet he links to it like it’s some kind of slam-dunk explanation of *what’s really going on* “globally” with “sea level.” 

Know what?

No one has any idea whatever if “sea level” is rising or not.  They have no idea how to accurately measure this complex phenomena.  

Perhaps the “angry” Tobis would like to return and argue that sea level measurement is completely uncontroversial? I don’t mean controversy among “deniers,” however — I mean basic controversy among the supposed experts of the consensus.  Perhaps there are papers that disclose that sea level measurement is, well, quite possibly not entirely transparent?  

Why do people *pretend* that “sea level” is something clearly understood and crisply measured? 

They do this because quasi-scientific blather like we read at the link Tobis supplies can be *put over* on the innumerate and the credulous. 

Again.  There is nothing in the alarmist schtick of AGW that doesn’t derive wholly and necessarily from the projections of primitive GCM’s that are admitted as primitive by the modelers who are constantly “improving” same.  

This point should be hammered.  Every alarmist “scenario” is nothing more than a whimsical model projection.  Period.  There’s nothing else there.  

~0.7C rise over the last century ain’t cutting it as a catastrophe.  And there’s no reason to suspect this trivial rise will suddenly explode higher — unless you are credulous enough to believe in “expert projections” drawn from low-level GCM’s.  

And if you believe that, I’ve got a sinecure in a University to sell you.   

I advise epistemological modesty be observed. 

Grypo #60. Unfortunately for you the “extremist pseudo-skeptics” now seem to include Mark Lynas and George Monbiot- both of whom have noted that they were misled by the green movement on the question of how to address emissions. Both of whom are now waiting – with the rest of us – for you to climb down off your pedestal and get to work.
 

Keith,
Perhaps I’m being overly simplistic but it seems to me that the study merely confirms that people will process information about politicized issues through political (i.e. cultural) filters.  Unfortunately, we don’t have a time machine so data on how the responses may have differed when climate change wasn’t so politicized isn’t available.  However, I’d wager that the results would in fact be different in the direction of more science education leading to more acceptance of the mainstream view.
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This raises two questions.  First, given the particulars of the climate problem (e.g. international in scope, asymmetrical costs/benefits across time and space), is it reasonable to think that the politicization of climate change could have been avoided?
The second, more interesting question IMO, is what do we do now? I’m sympathetic to Michael’s question, as it isn’t immediately obvious what the ethical response to the problem is.  Perhaps the authors address this in the study (I’ve only read the abstract). How do you depoliticize the issue?  Given the state of American politics, I’m not sure if this is even possible.  Has any issue that has become part of the culture war (e.g. gun control) ever been depoliticized to the point where reasonable discussion about trade-offs becomes possible?

@ MT (6)

I don’t know why you called my statement obnoxious b/c what you’re saying is not materially different. Of course nobody says that you guys are blood thirsty just for the sake of it. You are good guys, your hearts are in the right place, that’s for sure. But when you say

Just strategically, convincing the public that the matter is serious  becomes easier the greater the catastrophes

it means (to me) that you are welcoming 10,000 deaths because it will help saving millions or even the planet itself. Trust me, I also have a choice word for this kind off attitude but being a polite person I won’t say it.

(49)

I can appreciate your frustration. Some people here simply won’t listen. But your approach of providing the “information” of your choice is not going to work anyway. This is because the information is complicated and gray. Pretending that it’s black-and-white doesn’t help your case. You need to think about information support base of lukewarmers. For example when you talk about sea level rise (can’t see that link from work) remember that anyone can go online and find the graph that shows no acceleration in Wikipedia. When you arrogantly talk about warming over the last decade, remember that Phil Jones admitted that there is no statistically significant warming since 1995. (I know it’s not mutually exclusive but this is beside the point.) You are correct that

the global temperature change over a single decade are not the best way to get a handle on the situation

but if you want to be credible you need to discuss this point from a 12 year ago perspective. Somehow back then none of you guys we saying that. For how long will the temp plateau need to persist before the consensus community agrees that the GCMs are wrong?

Dr. Tobis, I doubt if anyone has ever labeled you a skeptic.
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I think the case can be made that the public is reacting rationally with regards to this issue. They support environmentalism and the broad thrust of dealing with climate change, but do not believe the consensus explanation of impacts is strong enough to support radical economic overhaul.
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As we speak, I am sitting in the viewing room of an interview facility watching interviews being conducted on a related issue. So far, 100% of the people I have listened to strongly support efforts to deal with environmental issues and switch to renewable fuels. All of them.
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All of them also say that this conversion needs to lead off with the economic benefits to their families–they understand renewables are good for the planet. That case has been made. But they have to be able to afford it.
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Seems pretty rational to me.

@ 66

I do not, therefore, understand Keith’s point.

I’m afraid you don’t indeed.

He seems to suggest that the “deficit model” asserts that public understanding is sufficient.

No he doesn’t. See, you are rightfully upset with people who don’t listen to you. But then you turn around and do the same thing.

Tom @ 67. PRECISELY!

This should be the starting point of the policy issues. RP JR goes on ad infinitum about this. The battle for making the change has been won. Even today a vast majority of Americans feel that way (Canadians too). But what is the cost? What is the timeline? Why do I have to subsidise others’ enrgy costs? And if you want to go to the WORST argument, bringing up kids and grandkids – WILL MY HEIRS HAVE AS GOOD OF A SOCIETY AS I GREW UP IN, OR WILL THEY BE DESPERATELY POOR  to save the world from a maybe catastrophe?

@65
Of course you know that warming since 1995 is now statistically significant and that sea level rise has indeed been accelerating compared to historical background levels.
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Please stop lying.  Seriously.
 

Marlowe, you illustrate one difficulty in communicating effectively with the public.
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Phil Jones can indeed breathe a sigh of relief as his tortured statement is now redeemed by the passage of time. Yes indeed, the climate has warmed since 1995, and that warming is statistically significant. But Marlowe, how much has it warmed? Expressed decadally? And how does that compare to modelled predictions? (And yes, you can say that those 16 years are too short–but then we should ask about all 30-year periods since 1880, only to find out that none of them has been 2 degrees C at a century-level rate.)
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Similarly, sea level indeed has risen. How much? How has that varied over the period covered by global warming?
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You don’t say. And the public knows that you don’t say. The people I am listening to right now are saying that they don’t know who to believe because the numbers get all jumbled up.
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Global warming is not proceeding according to plan. Temperatures are rising more slowly than you and those you support had predicted, and sea levels are rising, but more slowly than you had predicted. Your models are running hot.
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You are not giving the public much to work with.

Marlowe, feel free to ignore me. Feel free to ignore the public. Feel free to ignore everyone who doesn’t agree with you.
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But then don’t come back all angrified when we haven’t been listening to you.

@78
And what was the annual rate prior to 1994?
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“Current sea level rise has occurred at a mean rate of 1.8 mm per year for the past century,[1][2] and more recently, during the satellite altimetry era of sea levelmeasurement, at rates in the range of 2.9-3.4 ± 0.4-0.6 mm per year from 1993″“2010.[3][4][5][6][7]”

Again.  Please stop lying. Seriously.

Tom you’re right.  Liars like Sashka will cherrypick dates on the recommendation of people like Lindzen to lie/distort/create confusion. Somewhat different than the standard  Fuller approach (i.e. 1 part strawman + 2 parts ignorance + 1 part indignation) but the end result (FUD) suggests its equally effective.

@ 79

I admire your selective quoting prowess, Marlowe. Let me fill in the gap:

One 2008 study suggests that there has been an observed reduction in the prior rate of sea level by 2mm/yr from 2005 (a 60% reduction from the 1993 to 2005 rate) to a level of 1mm/yr.[8]

Did you really think you’d score some points that way? One look at the chart tells you the story. The lies, the spins, the cherry picking – nothing will change the reality no matter how many times you repeat it.

#63

Another reason why today the public is less willing to go along with the consensus is that this medium, the internet, has breached the monopoly of the mainstream to control the debate/information.

Hiya Jeff
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The sample frame is designed to be representative of middle class America, with the key criteria of home ownership. It’s amazing, the consistency of what they’re saying.
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These people really want to be green. They just want to know they can afford it.

I just got finished listening to a Latino guy in New Jersey, looks a bit like that cop on CSI Miami. Maybe 35. Nice guy.
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“I’m really interested in doing this (take up a certain type of renewable energy). I want my kids to live in a better world, and I don’t think it’s right that we are so dependent on oil. Saving money on my utility bills is great–but the cost. How long is the payback? This is expensive. Green is great–but it isn’t enough.”
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That pretty much echoes what everybody else in the study has said.

rustneversleeps, I would prefer a carbon tax rebated through lower social security taxes. Simpler and easier to understand.

They under-report their level of scientific understanding, saying they know very little but understanding both the basics of climate change and the remediating effects of the solution under discussion.
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They probably do not understand some of the terminology thrown around here on weblogs, but they understand the Greenhouse effect, global warming and what alternative forms of energy can do.
�
Not bad at all, I’d say. And many of them have heard of skeptical arguments about global warming, and they say I know there are some who disagree, but I don’t want to get into the numbers. It just makes sense to have another source of energy that doesn’t contribute to the problem. (I’m paraphrasing and combining responses from several.)

@ rust

I’m not sure why you direct this question to Tom but I keep asking the same. Why wasn’t this approach broadly discussed? I have yet to meet anybody who’d say it’s a bad idea.

I think it should be noted that this report doesn´t tell us anything about the correlation between knowledge of climate science and judgement on the risk of climate change.

That said, I agree with Keith Kloor on his basic points.

In the report I find some interesting statements like:

“Citizens who hold hierarchical and individualistic values discount scientific information about climate change in part because they associate the issue with antagonism to commerce and industry..Individuals are prone to interpret challenges to beliefs that predominate with their cultural community as assaults on the competence of those whom they trust and look to for guidance. That implication – which naturally provokes resistance – is likely to be strengthened when communicators with a recognizable cultural identity stridently accuse those who disagree with them of lacking intelligence or integrity” (p. 15)

I don’t know how well this is substantiated in this paper or other research, but it sounds to me as good advice on how not to speak to a climate skeptic.

There’s been remarkably little discussion of tax credits, deductions, rebates, state and city grants, etc. I’m sure you’re right at some level, but they’re primarily concerned about net costs after all the goodies have been bestowed.

Tom, here’s a fine example of credits, deductions and grants in eco-action: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/31/AR2011013104862.html
The owner of a 4,400 square-foot house in Washington D.C.’s toniest suburb got over $14,000 in subsidies from the feds, city and state for his new air conditioner. Now, let’s see $14,000 times 170 million households in the U.S. is…

Tom, here in BC we have a carbon tax. The only thing that I remember from it is that at a certain low income threshold, the provincial government rebates what they calculate that low earner has spent in CT. I am sure there are other plans, but to be honest, I have been living with it for about 3 years now, and don’t even think about it anymore. The other thing that I just remembered, is that we tend to have the highest gasoline prices in Canada also, but then I think about the European prices and just start to whistle…..

JeffN, I have no real problem with the subsidies going out at the level currently disbursed. We have had success with subsidizing nascent industries in the past, and it kind of tickles me that we are subsidizing consumers rather than companies, at least partially. And it’s really small potatoes–what, $23 billion? Especially as much of that is foregone revenue rather than checks mailed out, I don’t think it should be a blocker.
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Sashka, no, it was discussed publicly (except for the horsetrading possibilities.) And agreement was quite general, including from the major environmental organisations, that cap and trade was the way to go. Sadly…

@ MT (103)

If you are saying that a tax-dividend legislation was actually introduced in Congress, could you provide a reference?

@ TF (105)

Could you point me to any remaining trace of public discussions on tax-dividend?

Sashka, I don’t think it was formally introduced, but it was certainly on the table.
 

“rustneversleeps, I would prefer a carbon tax rebated through lower social security taxes. Simpler and easier to understand.”

I don’t think the complexity would matter much, and because of that, you can neutralize government intake by spreading rebates over several taxes, and not stress the social security system.  But then again, I imagine the tax I prefer is larger than yours.

MT, Saska, Tom, et al
The bill closest to what we are discussing was Cantwell-Collins, around the same time as the House cap and trade was tanking in the Senate.

http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2010/02/15/15climatewire-cantwell-collins-bill-generates-lobbying-fre-54450.html
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with a quote from our own Ken Green

The paper’s evaluation of scientific literacy is generally confined to very basic high school material – such as how long it takes the Earth to revolve around the Sun, and doesn’t really measure one’s knowledge of more advanced physics/chemistry/other atmospheric science (although I suspect the denial blogs are framing it rather differently).  Add a little (but not a lot) of knowledge to a big ego and heavily-skewed individualistic ideology and you’ve got youself a fervent contrarian. 

So the paper’s results aren’t much different from polls that show similar skepticism among the generally-educated to vary most widely based on ideology, nor do they challenge conclusions that the most qualified experts in climate science are the least skeptical of manmade global warming.

That said, a few percentage points of those with the highest credentials related to  climate science still remain blinded by ideology on the issue – Roy Spencer for example.

http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/07/06/261843/roy-spencer-job-minimize-the-role-of-government/

although they are clearly the exception.

What the paper does say is that simply teaching people high school math/science isn’t going to make a big difference by itself.  It’s also unrealistic to expect the vast majority of the population to obtain advanced knowledge in atmospheric science – the kind that would trump (in all but the Roy Spencer-type cases) ideological biases.  And there’s the challenge. 

Keith: “no cultural shift will emerge until differing worldviews are given greater consideration in the climate debate”

The Earth’s climate doesn’t respond to “differing worldviews”, other than the extent that such worldviews result in the altering of atmospheric composition. 

How does one soften the impact of ideological biases, to the point where a reasonably-educated person doesn’t let their “worldviews” cause them to deny science?  One might ask why global warming skepticism is much lower in educated European nations compared to the United States.  Some worldviews are regarded by their adherents as simply incompatible with the implications of climate science, as outlined by the John Abrams article on his former skepticism, so we should strive for a society where such intellectually-crippling worldviews are challenged.  Consistent teaching of critical thinking skills K-12 might be effective as a start.

Well, all I can say is back in the real world, people accept that the globe is warming and are willing to do something about it. They want it to make sense financially. They have heard of skeptics but haven’t dived in too deeply. They understand the greenhouse effect and that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. More CO2 contributes to more warming.
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Just how literate do you want them to be?

The science isnt sttled Marlowe. Virtually anyone who has some technical knowledge does accept that CO2 causes some warming – but it is very uncertain how much, since far less warming is ocurring than the models predict. The models accuracy is also getting worse over time, not better. That isnt characteristic of predictive models that are any good.

By the way, abusing people wont settle the science either.

@ Marlowe

Hansen’s proposal, known as cap and dividend was most recently captured in this bill which of course never made it out of committee”¦
I don’t understand the “of course” part. The committee votes by simple majority and it was a Democratic majority at the time. So, whose fault is that?
Thanks for the link, grypo. Upon a brief read, these bills are not exactly what we are talking about but are in the same spirit.
 

�
 Yes perhaps US skepticism is because you do “do culture wars better”, but I think there may be a specific political factor too.
  In the US one major party has opposed the CAGW crusade, (if only because of pressure from the Tea Party). Suddenly that makes it respectable to reject, or express doubts, in polite society. That is exactly what happened in Australia – the Coalition (conservatives) changed from supporters to opponents, seemingly due to strong pressure from their grass roots supporters. Since then support for doing anything expensive about AGW has declined from nearly 70% to hardly 40% down under.

  But in Europe all mainstream parties support the crusade, so there is no respectable lightning rod. (Minor parties that may oppose the crusade in Europe, tend to be nutty and sometimes a bit racist)

Keith, culture and values can change rapidly, more rapidly than some people seem to think.
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Paul, “the burden of the tax falls on those least able to pay” does, unfortunately hold to some extent, in America and a few other countries.

Rural poor folk in drafty, isolated houses are more energy dependent than urban poor folk in tightly packed apartments with bus service available and in principle easily expanded. A carbon tax would therefore impact the red states much more severely than the blue ones. There may need to be some cushion put in place for poor rural folk to adjust.

In most countries poor people don’t have cars or big drafty houses on isolated dusty roads. It’s largely a peculiarly American problem. And it is peculiar, when you think about it.

But what of Mitt Romney? He is for action on the climate.

Bill #121 said
” But in Europe all mainstream parties support the crusade, so there is no respectable lightning rod. (Minor parties that may oppose the crusade in Europe, tend to be nutty and sometimes a bit racist)”
I think that has changed a bit. Witness the the recent defeat  of an attempt to raise greenhouse gas cut for 2020 from 20 % to 30 % in the European Parliament.
The Kyoto Protocol is in practice dead and even the EU hesitates to renew their obligation:
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2011/0618/1224299152884.html

Bill# 128
I think it has been reported in the European MSM. I saw at least one editorial here in Finland.
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About the original point discussed: Does increased information about AGW lead to scepticism or acceptance of AGW as a fact?
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I had an experience with a college class of about 30 young people. We were talking about monopolies and utility companies in monopoly position. European cap and trade came up and out of curiosity, I asked them how it works.
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Nobody knew how it really works. They all assumed that companies buy pollution permits and that the governments collect the money.
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When I told them that electricity companies get the permits for free but can charge customers for them, they were just flabbergasted. The idea they had got through MSM is that companies pay for the permits.
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Then couple students started talking that maybe the warming is not so real either. They had seen some sceptical stuff about AGW.
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Anyway, my take on this is that MSM paints a picture of all AGW-related issues that is far more certain and positive than the reality and conveniently ignores the problems both with science and existing mitigation mechanisms. When people find out the facts they may feel betrayed or misled.
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Personally, I feel that the scientists have to educate people more about uncertainties of climate science and cut down the catastrophy bulletins. People are not dumb. Telling scary stories of impending disasters and then later admitting, ” well, it might happen… or not” is interpreted as crying wolf.
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Over here people tend to forget that a vast majority of people are not educated about AGW. They just listen to MSM and pick stuff from the headlines. If they actually start reading papers to find out how likely the catastrophies are, they will be disappointed. The same goes with IPCC.

A couple things to remember about the carbon tax idea:
- a tax and dividend would be difficult in this country because it has a republican (small-R) govt. There are a lot of rural congresspersons and they are well aware that a tax and dividend does a wonderful job of setting a regressive tax and sending the money to cities.
- Europe does like “the crusade” because of climate, but never discount Europe’s desire to control the revenue from a tax on Americans. Remember all the glorious stories about discussions prior to and at Copenhagen about the $30 billion “fund” the UN was eager to have at it’s disposal from carbon fees, taxes contributions etc, a big chunk of which was expected from Obama.
- I linked to a story about a $14,000 subsidy to a wealthy man in Washington DC for a new airconditioner for a reason (see comment 101). It makes no economic sense to pay $12,000 per family for the very tiny GHG savings this system would provide, makes no sense to ask people who are suffering in this economy to pony up more taxes to hand over $14,000 checks to tycoons. The fact is that a pre-requisite to a carbon tax will be an answer to the question – what will you buy with it? So far the answer is – stuff that doesn’t work and slush funds for Eurocrats.
Why are you surprised nobody votes for that?

Marlowe Johnson, I pay as much attention when you agree with me as I do when you insult me. None to speak of. Your comments here and elsewhere make it obvious that your opinions do not contribute to useful understanding.

KK: speaking of culture war, here is a possible example for you, as well as an interesting study in creative writing,  Since you know the academic scene, I’m curious if you’ve run into this NAS (National Association of Scholars, not the other NAS) or  Peter Wood before.
http://chronicle.com/blogs/innovations/bottling-up-global-warming-skepticism/29754
Reposted at the NAS website:
http://www.nas.org/polArticles.cfm?Doc_Id=2080

Phil Jones canard can be found here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8511670.stm

Mr. Kloor -

Lindzen often bring up a point that is much overlooked in this debate, but it bears on the study in question.  Namely, that “climate science” (a synthetic discipline made up by the IPCC) is populated by persons who, frankly, do not have the superior science and math skills that are requisite for mature disciplines like electrical engineering, physics, etc.  Not sure what your training is, but if it is solely in journalism, you might be unduly swayed by the fact that the “climate scientists” have strings of initials after their name and teach in the Ivy League.  Many of them, despite the paper credentials, are “enviros” who went into this field to save the world and who use math in cookbook fashion.  Hard as it might be for someone like you to believe this, the “amateur” climate scientist like Lucia, of Jeff Id, or certainly Ross McKitrick has superior analytical skills to the Menn of the world.

@ 141

Many of them, despite the paper credentials, are “enviros” who went into this field to save the world and who use math in cookbook fashion. 

Statistics? Examples? Anything to back it up?

Keith,
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Thanks for bringing this interesting article to my attention. Over at Ecological Sociology I’ve got an extended reflection on it. The basic point: while the culture war model is a much better representation than the deficit model, it still fails to come to grips with the complexities necessary for understanding public opinion.
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http://ecologicalsociology.blogspot.com/2011/07/climate-change-culture-wars.html
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Gary

@ 149

I’m not sure I follow what you said in the end:

This presents a vexing challenge for many of us who want to participate in an active debate but also want to reach those that belong to that third group.

Do you consider yourself a member of one of the ideological factions?
 

Tom C: ” Namely, that “climate science” (a synthetic discipline made up by the IPCC) is populated by persons who, frankly, do not have the superior science and math skills that are requisite for mature disciplines like electrical engineering, physics, etc.  Not sure what your training is, but if it is solely in journalism, you might be unduly swayed by the fact that the “climate scientists” have strings of initials after their name and teach in the Ivy League.  Many of them, despite the paper credentials, are “enviros” who went into this field to save the world and who use math in cookbook fashion.  Hard as it might be for someone like you to believe this, the “amateur” climate scientist like Lucia, of Jeff Id, or certainly Ross McKitrick has superior analytical skills to the Menn of the world.”
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I don’t care to discuss this tendentious claim in detail, but it would be a shame if nobody stood up to say that it is both rude and wrong.
 

MT,
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Now that the science has once again been successfully defended. Let’s get back to picking one thing and going after it. Whatever it is it should be pro-active action. I’m still looking.

I am concerned about what the science is saying.
And what is it that the “science” is saying, in your view, beyond the fact that CO2 is warming the planet?

#157. Count me with Rust on that one. I just don’t get what it is I am supposed to admit. I wish Keith would formulate it as a proposition rather than as a slogan. “It seems to me that Tobis believes X”. Then Tobis could comfortably say, “Sure, X.” or “No way, Not X!” or whatever. But all I know is that I have a case of “deficit model”.
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I certainly have no idea how to have a democracy if true information isn’t valued. Is that the proposition? “Tobis believes widespread accessibility and access of valid information is important to the function of democracy. Kloor does not. This is called the “information deficit” hypothesis and we are arguing it here.
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Somehow I cannot bring myself to believe that Keith does not accept the validity of the proposition.
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The other possible parsing is that “sufficient information sufficiently well conveyed is enough to resolve this (or in the strong form, any) controversy”. I do not believe this, and if this is the proposition we have no argument. But I have a hard time believing Keith thinks this is my position, given that I have disavowed it several times.
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So I am baffled about what it is we are actually arguing about.
 

Rust #156,

“We can’t both be right”.

You hit the nail on the head. Both you and your loquacious golf partner can be intelligent, scientifically educated people, with access to the same information, and come to entirely different conclusions about the risk the planet faces, what the best way forward is, etc.

You both can’t be right, it is true. But, you both can be just guessing. It will be useful if people engaged in these discussions would admit which parts of their arguments are solid mathematically and scientifically, and which parta are just guessing. Few things irritate more than a partisan (on either side, or even a journalist) elevating a guess to a fact; once that line gets crossed  polite & rational discussion closes down quickly.

@ 158
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I asked about before but I never got any answers: when we talk about probabilities in the climate context, do we mean our ignorance or the chaotic properties of the system?
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BTW, what is the statement that you quoted based on? Is there a published paper where the probability is calculated? If it’s “very high” why not just state the number?

This will always get back to the question of whether or people properly understand the risk and understand who is under that risk. There IS a ‘deficit’ in information.  If you are one of those people who simply prescribe to the notion that CO2 will warm the planet, then you are at an information deficit if you do not understand the time scales and risk of consequences.  While values are the ultimate reason for deciding on policy, people cannot and will not make decisions based on their values if they do not understand the risk.  There is a large, well-funded contingency that wants to make sure people don’t take these risks into consideration when thinking about what they want to accomplish in legislation.  Until the media and scientific community in the US and Canada come to grips with this reality, gauging the public’s opinions on policy is limited. While many uncertainties remain, the fact that we are under severe risk from a warming planet is not one of them.  If someone doesn’t hammer that home, we will not produce any legislation that come close to solving that problem.  You don’t calm fears of risk by ignoring that it exists or downplaying it’s role in future realities. THAT is the ‘deficit’!

@ grypo (165)

There IS a “˜deficit’ in information.

I don’t think so: the information is easily available for anyone who is interested. The problem is to tell the difference between information, disinformation and speculation.

While many uncertainties remain, the fact that we are under severe risk from a warming planet is not one of them.

Repeating this ad nauseum doesn’t make it true.

I’m afraid the risk is quite real.

You have the right be afraid but it doesn’t mean I should be.

Just to make it clear, I also believe that the risk is real. However, unlike you, I don’t know whether it is small or severe and I am upfront about it. You, OTOH, are claiming possession of some “information” that, AFAIK, doesn’t exist. To me, you sound like yet another alarmist who can’t back up his catastrophic prognostications.

No, I don’t assume anything. I quote the same line from you again:
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While many uncertainties remain, the fact that we are under severe risk from a warming planet is not one of them.
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Once again, this is not a fact but a figment of your imagination.

The arguments from blind faith in the pseudo-science aren’t convincing at all. In reality these alleged multiple lines of evidence are based on fakery and dubious assumptions or on the models that have never predicted anything correctly.

To illustrate the difference between informed skepticism and blind faith consider the pane showing the pdf based on current climate mean state. The current CO2 concentration is about 387 ppm which is about 1.38 of preindustrial. Fortunately this number is close to sqrt(2) so we can use the log law to estimate the sensitivity based on current climate. The Earth warmed up by about 0.78C since preindustrial, so the sensitivity is roughly 1.6C. The graph however shows the pdf peaking at 3C. Why? Well, I don’t know (even linear continuation of the trend yields only about 2C) but clearly the authors assumed something interesting. The rest of the books are cooked similarly.

You can get together 9 pregnant women but the child won’t be born in a month. Similarly, you can’t use a bunch of unreliable results to knock together a reliable one. Science doesn’t work like that.

“Similarly, you can’t use a bunch of unreliable results to knock together a reliable one. Science doesn’t work like that.”

This is untrue.

For instance, how people plan expensive oil wells is precisely by collating evidence from data streams that individually are coarse and unreliable.

Hurricane tracks are another example, where several unreliable models are used and most often a consensus among the majority of them is achieved and the outliers ignored. These approaches have demonstrable skill.

A fairly simple statistical model of uncertainty underlies this process. Two independent noisy measures of the same quantity can be combined to a less noisy estimate.

Of course, “independence” is at issue. But in terms of climate sensitivity to greenhouse forcing, we have multiple independent sources of paleoclimate data, as well as the emerging model-based theory (which is not trained on trends) and the observational trends.

“But it is worth noting that dubious assumptions play important role in every climate model.”

That’s a pretty broad statement.

“The graph however shows the pdf peaking at 3C. Why? Well, I don’t know.” So you aren’t paying attention, yet you are happy to go beyond ordinary criticism to accusations of “fakery”. This is not fair and would not be considered acceptable civilized discourse were we in the same room. I don’t know why it should be considered acceptable here.

BTW, does “hide the decline” qualify as fakery, in your opinion?

You don’t have to talk about anything, here or elsewhere. Just don’t pretend that dubious assumptions don’t exist.

Not exactly my position but never mind. What is your definition of rational strategy in the face of unquantifiable risks?

Just as an aside…

The well-word physician analogy is really terrible.  Physicians base their opinions on clinical trial and real world experience with many patients.  This is hardly analogous to the climate change sciences,

Moreover, I recently heard/read (forgot where) that even double blind clinical trials suffer from bias, which ought to at least underline the bias potential in the (much less certain) world of climate projections.

But, carry on.

I take it that despite you start off wit “if” there is no “if”. Because if the risks could have been quantified normally there would be no need to ask the experts. To summarize, this whole alarmist story line “science says” is in fact a pure fantasy as far as climate risks are concerned.

Now, without any disrespect to the experts I have little trust in their views. Not because I think they are stupid or corrupt but because the problem is too complex. It is a fallacy to suggest that the best and brightest are any closer to the truth than laymen. You can read about the history of financial markets to see how often this is not the case.

Therefore I disagree with the validity of the existing risk assessments.

” It is a fallacy to suggest that the best and brightest are any closer to the truth than laymen. You can read about the history of financial markets to see how often this is not the case.”
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The analogy fails in several ways. First, because financial markets have no connection to underlying physical theorems, the situations are not comparable. Second (though related), the situations are different because there is no broad consensus in economics or finance.
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As far as I know, we do not have a consensus of financial experts on specific well-defined causes of long-term instability.  If we do, we ought to act upon it.
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Finally, look at it this way. We know we are changing the underlying physics to an extent much greater than the past natural forcing of great climate convulsions. We can dismiss pretty much all of climate science and still know this based on some fairly straightforward arguments from the Milankovic cycle, the ice cores, and geomorphology. So, even accepting the (rather absurd) premise that experts know no more than lay people, we have clear evidence of a monotonically growing forcing of significant amplitude.
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If we know nothing, we do not know that this has not already reached cataclysmic proportions. The less we know, the more care we should take. To argue the contrary is to argue that the driver in a fog should take more chances than the driver in clear conditions. Like much of the contrarian argumentation, it makes no real sense.
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Doubt on the maturity of climate science should be accompanied by the greatest possible circumspection about anthropogenic forcing. Wallace Broecker takes essentially this position, and arguably James Lovelock is roughly on this territory. On the other hand, the attacks on climate science which lead to delay on policy implementation are self-contradictory and irrational.
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I share this to some extent. I think we have a good enough picture of the next century, but a great deal of uncertainty about the following ones. The response to the anthropogenic kick is not going to go away for a very long time, but the shape of that response is not well constrained by present knowledge. I am astonished by people who find a license to keep disrupting the planet in that uncertainty.
 

@188
we’ve been over this before.  what is to prevent energy security fellow from pursuing a strategy that is consistent with his concerns but inconsistent with the climate concerned guy (i.e. coal to liquids)? If climate isn’t the primary driver these sorts of consequences can result. Ethanol is probably the best example (where domestic ag interests were the main driver not energy security or climate change)…
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FWIW it’s sustainability that should be the primary driver not climate change specifically.  Balancing the latter with the myriad other factors that define the former is the challenge…

@190
No.  The Ag lobby is one of the few that transcends party affiliation in D.C. You can thank the founding fathers for that one. Whether or not expanded ethanol use is tragic or not depends entirely on what your priorities are.  If your priorities are rural corn farmers in Iowa then it’s great.  if your concern is coastal marine ecosystems in the Gulf of Mexico then notsomuch.  My point is that while it’s great to handwaive about finding common ground, the reality is that most political issues come down to questions of power and influence (as the ethanol example amply illustrates)…

Good luck with that. Sincerely.

@ 184
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Back it up or shut up.
 

KK,
I find the manners of Tom C annoying. It’s OK, in my book, to be “in your face” and less than polite, but throwing out crap without substance is not. That’s against netiquette as I know it.

Well Tom C,
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You may indeed be rude (by your own admission) but that graph & the source article are pretty funny.

Sashka -

Don’t know what your background is, but the Mann hockey stick papers and the Steig Antarctica paper, to name just a few examples, are pathetic.  These guys are muddling around with stuff they don’t understand and it is painfully obvious.  The fact that such baloney is defended by science establishment types is a scandal.  There is no hard science field that would allow inferior work like this to go on for so long. 

As to finding one graph that backs up my point, I’m sure I could find another dozen, but why?  Again, everyone knows this.  Lindzen is absolutely right that this is still an immature science, that standards are low, and that the pool of talent is very shallow.

Sashka -

Sorry if my behavior has rubbed you the wrong way.  From your other comments it would seem that we agree on quite a lot.

Keep in mind what I said in my first post.  I was paraphrasing a point Lindzen has made several times.  So if you have a beef it is more with him than me.  His experience in the field for 50 years is the basis of his comments, not some graph or some study.  My experience in various academic and social settings and observation of the AGW controversies are the bases of my opinion.

Are there very smart people working in atmospheric sciences?  Of course.  Do they do sophisticated work?  Of course.  Are many of them smarter in math than me?  Very likely.  But apparently a majority can’t understand the multiple fallacies behind the approach that Mann employed.  I can.  A majority apparently can’t understand how Steig’s conclusions were based on PCA retention artifacts.  I can.  A majority can’t understand how the Tiljander sediment proxies were mis-used.  I can.

My claim is that something similar would never happen in a mature scientific discipline.  If you disagree, please tell me how the examples above continue to be so ferociously defended by the majority of climate scientists.