Thoughts on the IAC report
Aug 30, 2010
Bishop Hill in Climate: IPCC, Climate: Pachauri
I haven't got time to go through this in detail, but I'll jot down a few thoughts.
The overall impression is that they are recommending a lot of steps that will make little difference. They don't seem to have 'fessed up to what went wrong.
- The idea of having executive committee members from outside the climate science community is in principle sound, but only if they get people who are fundamentally critical of the AGW hypothesis. A sceptic-free IPCC is a credibility-free IPCC.
- The sections on the review process do not acknowledge the gatekeeping that has gone on. THis is "shut-eyed denial".
- Concentration on key issues is probably sensible, but you can't help but feel that this will be used as a route to sideline sceptic comments.
- The comments on uncertainty look completely damning to me:
[A]uthors reported high confidence in some statements for which there is little evidence. Furthermore, by making vague statements that were difficult to refute, authors were able to attach “high confidence” to the statements. The Working Group II Summary for Policy Makers contains many such statements that are not supported sufficiently in the literature, not put into perspective, or not expressed clearly.
- In any credible organisation, heads would be rolling.
- The comments on communication are quite funny. The answer (as ever) appears to be better PR.
- The transparency bit is limp. This particular bird has flown the coop. There is no point in asking for transparency over the appointments process when the authors for AR5 have already been appointed. No credible assessment report possible until AR6.
- This also applies to the section on dissenting views. Asking for author teams with diverse viewpoints is a bit late, isn't it? There is also no point saying that review editors should ensure dissenting views are reported. They are already supposed to do that, but choose not to do so.
Article originally appeared on (http://www.bishop-hill.net/).
See website for complete article licensing information.