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| 5/25 |
| 2004/6/21 [Science/GlobalWarming] UID:30929 Activity:insanely high |
6/21 Global warming will make cities hotter:
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996017
\_ Well, unlike global warming, this problem can be dealt with at the
local level:
http://www.greenroofs.com/Greenroofs101/index.htm
There are vaious ways to cut down on the heat island effect, and
they tend to also be things that make cities nicer anyway.
\_ Trees cause air pollution. --Gipper
\_ Who said anything about trees? We can just grow vegetables
on rooftops, like the Ketchup plant. -Gipper #1 fan
\_ I thought global warming was going to make the world colder? That
was the explanation when Al Gore gave his Global Warming speech on
one of the coldest days on record earlier this year. I'm so
confused. Are we heating or cooling? Why did they tell us 20 years
ago we were all going to freeze to death? Now they tell us we're
going to fry. *BUT* in the process of frying, we're all going to
freeze to death! Oh woe! The sky is falling!
\_ are you really this stupid? -tom
\_ are you really this ignorant and obtuse? everything I said
is true with a healthy dash of sarcasm thrown in for my own
amusement. you're probably too young to remember when they
assured us all we were going to freeze to death.
\_ Global warming can make things freeze, see "The Day
After Tomorrow"
\_ i think the fair answer is probably: yes, but the left is
just as dumb. If you want to see the spectacular
failure of the Right to understand how science works,
go read Crighton's speech at Caltech. To see how ignorant
of how science works your typical liberal is, try talking
to them about biotechnology.
\_ Are you stupid enough to believe in global warming &c.?
Read The Skeptical Environmentalist, might help you see
things from a better perspective.
\_ And note that the attacks on TSE were nearly all ad
hominem, argument from authority, and a whole boatload of
other logical fallacies. This more than anything
convinced me that the whole global-warming-believing
community is based on a house of cards. -emarkp
\_ as opposed to, say, Mormonism.
\_ He shoots! He scores!
\_ Not really. Mormonism, like all religions,
is based on faith. The main thesis of the
anti-global warming crowd is that global
warming is also based on faith, which
is a pretty bad situation for a scientific
theory. The above personal attack plays
right into their hands (I'm an athiest
who thinks climate change science is a mixed
bag, but that it's the anti-global warming crowd
who are actually basing their science
on faith.)
\_ Yeah, but I could care less about stupid
motd arguments, except when they become
funny as in the above case.
\_ BZZZT! Both pro and anti global warming
advocates *must* be basing their theories
in faith to some large degree or there
wouldn't be anything to debate. The pro-
side bases theirs on the arrogant assumption
that only humans can change the climate and
only humans can save it. This is akin to
the Smokey the Bear commercials. Only *you*
can prevent forest fires. Which is ignorant
pap because forest fires are actually a good
thing... for the forest! Not for people.
The anti- side is essntially saying, "Your
stuff is insufficient to prove anything. At
best you don't have enough data". There is
no faith here on either side unless you're
grinding that agenda axe again.
\_ I'd say the pro side is saying "It looks
like we're changing the climate, and on
something this important we should err on
the side of caution." -pro person
\_ It looks like Iraq might have wmd
and on something this important we
should err on the side of caution
and invade the buggers.
\_ The anti-global warming crowd is
being scientific (skeptical) and stating
that the pro-global warming crowd's
evidence and proposed fixes are not
justified given the amount of information
we have. There are lots of other problems
that we could solve (global poverty for
ex.) using the money that the global
warming people want us to spend on
unproven methods that won't really
improve the quality of life for anyone.
\_ The anti-Iraq invasion crowd is being
scientific (skeptical) and starting
that the pro-invasion crowd's
evidence of WMD and links to terrorism
are not justified given the amount of
information we have. There are lots
of other problems that we could solve
using the money that the Iraq invasion
crowd did spend on an unproven invasion
that hasn't really improved the quality
of life for anyone.
\_ Scientific American, Nature and Science all have
debunked his "findings." You might claim that this
is just argument from authority, but the truth is
that these are the premier scientific publications
in the world and if they all agree on this fact,
then there is a very good chance that they are
correct and not the economically motivated reviews
in Business Week and the WSK. -ausman
in Business Week and the WSJ. Did you read the
Jan 2002 SciAM articles by the four scientists? -ausman
\_ I read the SciAm response. It was a collection of
logical fallacies. That was my /primary example/.
-emarkp
\_ I read the articles in Nature, Science and SciAm.
Frankly I was astonished that such remarkable
publications could stoop so low. The "response"
was in many ways restricted to particular bits
that the author has since posted updates and
clarifications to on this web page.
Some of the rebuttals sounded to me like the
desparate attempts of 19th century "scientists"
to keep darwin's ideas out of science.
The authors main point is that such narrow
thinking prevents us from seeing what the real
problems are (poverty, lack of education, &c.)
and solving those problems.
\_ most non millionaires think the book is a load of
crap,
http://www.csicop.org/scienceandmedia/environmentalist
\_ your reference for 'non millionaires' is http://csicop.org???
what does your class warfare mantra have to do with
anything?
\_ Go read Lomborg's pages on 'errors and corrections'
and 'critiques and replies'.
http://www.lomborg.com/books.htm
There may be some dubious references he's used but on the
whole the book is meticulously referenced and he has been
forthright in acknowledging any problems. His critics, on
the other hand, have been much less forthright or careful
about their criticism, relying on personal and political
attacks rather than debating the facts and policy proposals
as they should.
\_ i don't agree with the above 8 lines at all.
\_ thank you for adding nothing to this conversation.
\_ The funniest thing is that nations like Tuvula are
literally disappearing before our very eyes due to
global warming, while the coal lobby and their
allies continue to claim with a straight face that
no such thing as rising sea levels are occurring.
\_ no. TV is disappearing due to higher ocean levels.
no one knows if that is man made warming or natural
earth warming. there is a huge body of evidence that
supports the idea that this is part of a natural
cycle that we're not the cause of nor are we able to
influence cycles of that magnitude. the effect is
there but you assume there is only one possible cause.
\_ Looks like there's some disagreement in the comments above.
Decide for yourself. The Scientific American 11-page
criticism, and Lomborg's response to it, is posted at
http://www.greenspirit.com/lomborg . Read it and see what
you think. Personally, I think it makes SciAm look like a
bunch of politically-motivated idiots.
\_ Why look at an edited version that makes Lomborg look
better than he really does? The SciAm article, his
responses and replies to that and others are here:
http://www.csua.org/u/7uf
\_ freeze dried or freeze fried?
\_ I'm really not sure. The "science" of global warming is too
internally inconsistent and agenda ridden to figure out. |
| 5/25 |
|
| www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99996017 Summer nights are going to get stickier - especially in the city. An analysis by the UK Met Office shows that the effects of global warming will be much more intense in urban areas, where vehicles and buildings heat the air and asphalt and concrete retain heat at night. As many city-dwellers are aware, urban air is often hotter than that of the countryside, where fields and forests absorb less heat in the day and give it up more readily at night. But Richard Betts of the Met Office's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction in Exeter, Devon, says this "urban heat island" effect will intensify. Betts told a conference on Gaia and climate change in Dartington, Devon, earlier in June that a doubling of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere could triple the intensity of the heat island effect. Cities that now release an average of 20 watts of heat per square metre will in future release 60 watts more. Human health Londoners, says Betts, can expect many more sweaty nights as a result. In the past 30 years, there have only been 20 nights when the minimum temperature in London failed to fall below 20C. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science Doubling carbon dioxide levels will be likely to quadruple that figure. But add in the exaggerated urban heat island effect and it soars to six times the number - an extra three nights per year at least. "This could have quite significant effects on human health," he says. Last year's heat wave in Europe caused at least 20,000 deaths, for example. The findings coincide with the publication of research into the warming effect of cities in China. Liming Zhou of the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta reported that south-east China, which has extensive urban development, is warming 005C per decade faster than rural regions of the country. Heating within cities in the region is likely to be even greater. |
| www.greenroofs.com/Greenroofs101/index.htm Greenroofs 101 is our most popular section and it is lengthy, holding the nuts and bolts information about the earth friendly technology of organic greenroof architecture. We update this section often as new findings and ideas emerge. |
| www.csicop.org/scienceandmedia/environmentalist -> www.csicop.org/scienceandmedia/environmentalist/ Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty issued a decision that declared Lomborg's research "to fall within the concept of scientific dishonesty," and to be "clearly contrary to the standards of good scientific practice." The committee, however, did not find grounds that Lomborg "misled his readers deliberately or with gross negligence." Instead, the decision recommends that the book should be properly understood and interpreted as a "a provocative debate-generating paper." Scientific American, Science, and Nature strongly question the scientific merits of Lomborg's claims. He remains, however, highly regarded by conservatives and by the financial press. Clearly, The Skeptical Environmentalist has fueled Lomborg's personal celebrity. So, how did a book authored by an obscure Danish academic with little or no expertise in environmental science become an international media event? Or more precisely, what was so newsworthy about this book? Sketchy Science, Heavy Promotion The critiques of Lomborg's claims by scientists can be summarized and categorized as the following: * Lomborg misinterprets or misrepresents data. He criticizes the misuse of data by environmental groups and the media, but commits similar mistakes in his own work (Bongaarts, 2001; Lomborg selectively examines issues or problems that support his thesis that the state of the environment is improving, while ignoring other issues that refute his claims (Bongaarts, 2002; In other cases, he over-simplifies, commits gross-generalizations, or fails to discuss the issue of uncertainty and subjectivity in the data that he presents (Gleick, 2002; Schneider, 2001) * He uncritically and selectively cites literature, much of it non-peer-reviewed, and misinterprets or misunderstands the previously published scientific research (Gleick, 2002; Several scientists observe that most of Lomborg's 3,000 citations are to media articles and secondary sources (Pimm & Harvey, 2001; He ignores ecology and connections among environmental problems, taking instead a "human-centered" approach (Gleick, 2002). In several cases he uses statistical measures that are not valid indicators of the problems he reports are improving (Pimm and Harvey, 2001). The review appearing in Nature goes broader, and concludes that The Skeptical Environmentalist is "a hastily prepared book on complex scientific issues which disagrees with the broad scientific consensus, using arguments too often supported by news sources rather than by peer-reviewed publications" (Pimm & Harvey, 2001, p 150). The vast criticism of the book from credentialed scientists contrasts sharply with the early advance hype from the mainstream media. Just how so much glowing enthusiasm and credibility could be thrust upon a single book from an unknown author before experts could even begin to weigh its claims offers an excellent case study in the manufacture of news. Getting on the Agenda Lomborg first made his optimistic claims about the state of the environment in a series of newspaper op-eds published in his home country of Denmark. By Lomborg's count, the op-eds sparked some 400 news articles and commentaries in the Danish press. The vast amount of resistance to his optimistic views on the environment, and his debunking of what he termed "the litany" of extreme claims made by environmentalists, motivated him in 1998 to publish a Danish version of The Skeptical Environmentalist. The fracas went largely unnoticed outside of Denmark, but that would change with the fall 2001 release of an English version of the The Skeptical Environmentalist by Cambridge University Press. News of the pending book first appeared in the UK in early June of 2001 when a Sunday Times article by Nayab Chohan featured an advanced report of claims made by Lomborg that London's air was cleaner than at any time since 1585. Headlined "Cleanest London Air for 400 Years," the publicity hook was both local and timely, as the tail end of the article linked the book's questioning of the Kyoto climate change protocol to US president George W Bush's visit the same week to Europe, and Bush's controversial opposition to the treaty. The Times followed up the report the next day with a news article further detailing the book's Kyoto protocol angle. With The Times reports, Lomborg and his claims had made the Anglo media agenda. As is typically the case, other media outlets followed the reporting of the elite newspaper. Articles pegging the claims of The Skeptical Environmentalist to Bush's European visit ran later that week in the UK's The Express and Daily Telegraph, and Canada's Toronto Star. So in August 2001, when Nicholas Wade put together a 2,000 word mostly positive profile of Lomborg as part of the section's prestigious "scientist at work" feature, it proved to be a significant publicity coup for Lomborg. Indeed, probably the only thing that kept coverage of the book from completely taking off in the US after the New York Times profile was the September 11 terrorist attacks that dominated the news media's attention for the next six months. Dramatizing the Lomborg Affair Yet beyond what media researchers call the "inter-agenda setting" effect with coverage at elite news outlets setting off follow up coverage by other media (Trumbo, 1995), additional aspects of the Lomborg affair made the story especially appealing to journalists. Previous studies of the news have shown that journalists as a profession are attracted to compelling narratives, with a good story comprised of personalities, conflict, and the odd, peculiar, or unusual (Bennett, 2001). Specific to coverage of science, those issues that receive the greatest media attention are often those that are most easily dramatized, regardless of other more objective criteria (McComas & Shanahan, 1999). In terms of narrative, Lomborg was a ready-made movie script. Almost every news article about Lomborg made reference to the journey of self-discovery he describes in his book. He happened across an interview with Julian Simon, a University of Maryland economist known for his optimistic prediction that population growth was unlikely to exhaust the planet's resources. Later that year, an intrigued Lomborg set about in Denmark with ten of his brightest students to examine Simon's claims. Expecting to prove Simon wrong, Lomborg and his students were surprised to find that many of the economist's predictions about the state of the environment were on the mark. This discovery led Lomborg to pen a few op-eds for a center-left Danish newspaper, and eventually to the publication in Denmark of the first edition of The Skeptical Environmentalist. Not only did Lomborg offer a compelling personal narrative, but his claims were both unusual and controversial. Perhaps tired of the same old "doom and gloom" predictions of environmental scientists, journalists discovered in Lomborg a fresh perspective. His claims were those of a "maverick scientist," a favorite character in science news dramas (Dearing, 1995). Moreover, Lomborg's thesis fit the polarized, black and white style in which most public controversies are covered, with journalists featuring Lomborg's counter-claims against the most extreme arguments of environmentalists. In other instances, journalists evoked a "dueling scientists" frame, with Lomborg challenging conventional scientific wisdom. Finally, most journalists fell victim to the smoke screen of scholarship that the book projected. Over and over again, as supporting evidence for Lomborg's claims, journalists made reference to the book's 515 pages, 2,930 endnotes, and 182 tables and diagrams, as if sheer volume of words and data were proof enough of scientific merit. Constructing Expert Endorsement The credibility of the The Skeptical Environmentalist was further promoted by reviews in leading newspapers that were inexplicably glowing, and tributes in the conservative and financial press that were predictably enthusiastic. In several leading newspapers, experts from the environmental sciences were noticeably absent from the crop of reviewers. Instead, the newspapers turned to popularizers, writers with a literary flair that lacked ... |
| www.lomborg.com/books.htm critiques and replies In The Skeptical Environmentalist Bjrn Lomborg challenges widely held beliefs that the global environment is progressively getting worse. Using statistical information from internationally recognized research institutes, Lomborg systematically examines a range of major environmental issues and documents that the global environment has actually improved. He supports his argument with over 2900 footnotes, allowing discerning readers to check his sources. Lomborg criticizes the way many environmental organizations make selective and misleading use of scientific data to influence decisions about the allocation of limited resources. The Skeptical Environmentalist is a useful corrective to the more alarmist accounts favored by green activists and the media. probably the most important book on the environment ever written." review in The Daily Telegraph, UK, 27-8-01 "This is one of the most valuable books on public policy - not merely on environmental policy - to have been written for the intelligent general reader in the past ten years. review in The Economist, 6-9-01 "The Skeptical Environmentalist is the most significant work on the environment since the appearance of its polar opposite, Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, in 1962. |
| www.greenspirit.com/lomborg -> www.greenspirit.com/lomborg/ Scientific American Threatens to Sue Bjorn Lomborg for Daring to Defend Himself. Now They Threaten Greenspirit, Too SUPPORT THE SKEPTICAL ENVIRONMENTALIST - PUBLISH AND DISTRIBUTE HIS RESPONSE TO SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN'S ATTACK! Whereas the popular media have generally reported positively on the 500-plus page analysis of the global environment, the scientific press in North America has been negative to the point of personal insult. It is very clear that extreme environmentalists are deeply threatened by the breath of fresh air Lomborg brings to the debate. Among the most scathing of the attacks on Lomborg was an 11-page editorial in the January 2002 edition of Scientific American. With the rather high-handed title "Science Defends itself Against the Skeptical Environmentalist" the editorial declared the book a "failure" and invited four prominent environmentalists to do their worst to discredit Lomborg and his analysis. Scientific American did not give Lomborg any opportunity to respond to his critics, even though they gave him a copy of the editorial before it went to press. They said they would give Lomborg one page in a future edition to reply to 11 pages of full-on attack. Lomborg's response was to publish the text of the Scientific American article on his own website and to intersperse it with a detailed response to every point raised by his critics. Scientific American then threatened to sue Lomborg over copyright. In response to my complaint Scientific American wrote "This is an infringement of our copyright and interferes with our business of selling the article." Does Scientific American really think that they will lose readership because Lomborg has posted a response to a publication that is already off the newsstands? I believe they acted out of political motivation and are purposefully stifling Lomborg's efforts to defend himself. And I don't blame Lomborg for giving in to such a huge organization when threatened with legal action. Anyone who reads his response to the Scientific American attack will have to agree that it is thoughtful and thorough. Here is a link to the entire response complete with Lomborg's comments. PDF Acrobat File) I call on all scientists, organizations, and citizens to publish this document on their websites. I do not believe Scientific American can prevent this legitimate right of free speech. Surely he has a perfect right to defend himself on his own website. If you do not have a website then send the document to someone who does. com that you have published Lomborg's rebuttal and I will publish a list of websites and organizations that have joined in this effort to bring some critical thinking and intellectual rigor back into the debate about the environment. I don't necessarily agree with every word of Lomborg's impressive book, but that is not the issue here. The environmental movement has become riddled with extremism, misinformation, misguided priorities and downright deception. It is wonderful that this dogmatic conceit is now being effectively challenged. Here is the entire text of Lomborg's response to the attack from Scientific American: Bjrn Lomborg's comments to the 11-page critique in January 2002 Scientific American (SA), (in black) Substantially finished December 31, 2001; latest update February 16, 2002, 16:47:45 Background: Recently I have received - through informal channels - the final proofs of an 11 page feature in Scientific American, all of it devoted to a trashing of my recent book The Skeptical Environmentalist, Cambridge University Press 2001 (referred as SE in references). By now, it appears that I will be able to present my views in a 1- page article in the May issue of Scientific American. This document is my chance to put my arguments to the readers of Scientific American with much greater detail and documentation. References to various works are, unless otherwise noted, to the same sources as used in SE. The text comes from the final draft and has been transferred from pdf into Word, meaning that occasionally italics or words may have been dropped. Most of the layout has been retained in headings, subheadings and usage of capital lettering. The first page (p61) is an editorial by editor-in-chief, John Rennie, the other ten pages flow in three columns into each other, with a sentence on each page in very large font for interest. These sentences will be pointed out below, but may come from an editorial decision. On the web, Scientific American describes the collection of essays thus: (SA) Misleading Math about the Earth ESSAYS BY STEPHEN SCHNEIDER, JOHN P HOLDREN, JOHN BONGAARTS AND THOMAS LOVEJOY The book The Skeptical Environmentalist uses statistics to dismiss warnings about peril for the planet. But the science suggests that it's the author who is out of touch with the facts. Science defends itself against The Skeptical Environmentalist (BL) This statement is potentially the most surprising of all - that the following critique should be science defending itself against my book. In a sense this encapsulates the bias of the following critiques. My book clearly makes a claim to science and to be factually based. I openly state the facts and my sources, and thus anybody is free to point out where these are faulty or incorrect and of course, such errors will then be posted on my web site. Thus, there is no need to defend science from my book - any possible defeat of science was never the issue. The discussion is whether the statements in my book are correct or not. The need to make it sound like a battle of science against my book seems entirely to misplace and bias the focus. Rather, the standpoint that might need to defend itself from my book would be the alarmist environmentalism, and that is perhaps the headline that would make more sense: Alarmist environmentalism defends itself against the Skeptical Environmentalist. Because environmental sciences are so keenly important to both our biological and economic survival--causes that are often seen to be in conflict--they deserve full scrutiny. With that in mind, the book The Skeptical Environmentalist (Cambridge University Press), by Bjrn Lomborg's reply to Scientific American January 2002 critique, 16-Feb-02 16:47 2/32 Lomborg, a statistician and political scientist at the University of Aarhus in Denmark, should be a welcome audit. As its subtitle--Measuring the Real State of the World-- indicates, Lomborg's intention was to reanalyze environmental data so that the public might make policy decisions based on the truest understanding of what science has determined. His conclusion, which he writes surprised even him, was that contrary to the gloomy predictions of degradation he calls "the litany," everything is getting better. Not that all is rosy, but the future for the environment is less dire than is supposed. Instead Lomborg accuses a pessimistic and dishonest cabal of environmental groups, institutions and the media of distorting scientists' actual findings. org) The problem with Lomborg's conclusion is that the scientists themselves disavow it. Many spoke to us at SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN about their frustration at what they described as Lomborg's misrepresentation of their fields. His seemingly dispassionate outsider's view, they told us, is often marred by an incomplete use of the data or a misunderstanding of the underlying science. Even where his statistical analyses are valid, his interpretations are frequently off the mark--literally not seeing the state of the forests for the number of the trees, for example. And it is hard not to be struck by Lomborg's presumption that he has seen into the heart of the science more faithfully than have investigators who have devoted their lives to it; it is equally curious that he finds the same contrarian good news lurking in every diverse area of environmental science. Many scientists, both in private and publicly (eg statements on the book) have praised the book. Below, you will see that none of the claims of "misrepresentation", "incomplete use of data" and "misunderstanding of the underlying science" are substantiated. The only specific claim presented here by the editor is t... |
| www.csua.org/u/7uf -> www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=00000B96-9517-1CDA-B4A8809EC588EEDF Skepticism toward The Skeptical Environmentalist forest The recent publication of The Skeptical Environmentalist, a book by Bjrn Lomborg (Cambridge University Press, 2001), ignited an international controversy. Lomborg, a Danish political scientist with a background in statistics, argues in his text that claims made by environmentalists about global warming, overpopulation, energy, deforestation, species loss, water shortages, and a variety of other issues are exaggerations unsupported by a proper analysis of environmental data. His message was widely publicized in the popular media and championed by political commentators traditionally opposed to environmentalist policies. Outraged voices within the mainstream scientific community quickly answered, however, that Lomborgs work was deeply flawed. His text, they said, misrepresented the actual positions of environmentalists and scientists, and his analysis was marred by invalidating errors that include a narrow, biased reading of the literature, an inadequate understanding of the science, and quotations taken out of context. Misleading Math about the Earth," in which four environmental expertsStephen Schneider, John Holdren, John Bongaarts and Thomas Lovejoycriticized The Skeptical Environmentalists arguments on global warming, energy, overpopulation and biodiversity. Lomborg has since written a detailed online rebuttal to our feature; |
| csicop.org -> www.csicop.org/ Links CSICOP encourages the critical investigation of paranormal and fringe-science claims from a responsible, scientific point of view and disseminates factual information about the results of such inquiries to the scientific community and the public. Upcoming CSICOP Event: The Skeptics Toolbox Skeptical Inquirer Magazine This dynamic magazine tells you what the scientific community knows about claims of the paranormal, as opposed to the sensationalism often presented by the press, television, and movies. |