Climate change astrology
I was handed a free copy of the WSJ Europe this morning. It contained the following snippet in the opinion section, spurred by a Japanese paper questioning the use (or rejection of) the scientific method in developing climate change models:
[T]oday’s climate science is so complex that only time – and a lot more observation – will tell whether what scientists think they know is really correct…. Until then, the alarmist findings by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are “an unprovable hypothesis”.
Here’s the full piece. Aside from it being nice to see The Register referenced in the mainstream media, the piece is worth bearing in mind the next time you hear scientists say “the science is clear that x” or politicans claim that “the consensus among scientists is that x“. Science is a process, not a consensus, and the significant of the problems that climate change can cause should not lead us to cut corners in that process.
Hmm WSJ has form on climate change denial. Try reading article and following through on a few links. The subject is devisive sure enough but the current science is clear even if predicting future weather is not.
I would be the first to admit (as a climate scientist) that climate scientists don’t have a proven hypothesis. If you sat down and talked to any of us we’d say exactly the same thing. We can’t prove what’s going to happen, that’s not how science works, and it really is a very complicated problem. However we can come up with possibilities, likelihoods and expectations, which is exactly how the IPCC report is framed. The science has come a long way since the start of the IPCC process, and with each report the predictions of the previous one have been either matched or exceeded by the observations, apart from a few cases where models needed tweaking, improved computing power meant we could be more subtle, or the climate system has just done something weird. With all this in mind there IS an underlying consensus about two main facts: It’s going to get warmer, and it’s our fault. What you do with that information is down to policy, politicians and the people. (God help us all).