Bishop Hill Shapiro speaks
Sep 3, 2010 Climate: IPCC Harold Shapiro, the economist who headed the IAC review of the IPCC, is interviewed at Climate Central. This is very interesting stuff, in particular the bit where Shapiro knocks down the suggestion that he thinks Pachauri should resign.
This was interesting too:
HS: We think all of our recommendations, if they’re thought to be helpful and useful, could in our view be implemented in the Fifth Assessment [which is currently in progress]. It’ s my own judgment that when people say you have to wait for the Sixth Assessment, it’s just a way of postponing action.
People like Myles Allen perhaps, who was writing at Comment is Free just yesterday...
Clearly, none of this is relevant to the 5th Assessment due to be published in 2013-2014: too much work has been done to make major changes at this stage, with author teams already in place. It will be thousands of pages long and will contain a couple ("catalogue") of errors that will be gleefully pointed out sometime in 2015. But now is the time to start thinking about what happens afterwards. We don't need to keep doing this to ourselves.
To my mind this means that we will not get a credible IPCC report until some time around 2020.
Reader Comments (30)
"To my mind this means that we will not get a credible IPCC report until some time around 2020"
... on what grounds do you predict that a credible IPCC report will be produced even if all the recommendations of the IAC review are accepted?
The whole concept of the IPCC process is flawed. The IPCC should be disbanded.
Disband the IPCC or not we won’t get a credible IPCC type report until we get credible science to report!
"Disband the IPCC or not we won’t get a credible IPCC type report until we get credible science to report!"
Sep 3, 2010 at 9:04 AM | martyn
Oh right. So presumably all the climate science done independently in countries all over the world in all flawed is it? Is it just rubbish because it disagrees with you then?
I'm afraid that I am with Myles Allen on this one. The superficial recommendations of the IAC will be implemented in AR5. The deeper ones will have to wait for AR6 -- or are more likely to be forgotten by then.
For instance, the IAC recommends that the review editors of the IPCC behave like journal editors. I completely agree (and indeed advised the IAC to say exactly that). Journal editors are cut from a certain wood. The people who volunteered to be review editors for AR5, and who were so appointed, are by and large people who wanted to put "IPCC" on their CV without doing anything.
So, the IPCC can beef up the office of review editor, but the current batch of review editors will not be up to the new job.
“So presumably all the climate science done independently in countries all over the world in all flawed is it”
Big word “presumably”
Why, in the age of the Internet, when people can twitter their thoughts every 5 minutes or so, does climate science still cling to putting out one lumbering report every 4 years which is out of date before it's even printed?
I guess climate science just isn't important enough to need to consider the latest technologies.
ML: Did you speak with people from outside the IPCC as well as inside?
HS: Yes, inside and outside -- supporters of IPCC and climate skeptics.
So who sceptics did the IAC directly talk to?
The into plays the "discovery of a few errors" card then Shapiro plays it again:
Harold, a modern car has typically 15,000 components - and they all work. Every. Single. One.
We are not talking about minor errors like bad spelling or mixing up the exact date of a study. We are talking about serious erros that were either not spotted or were spotted and ignored. The IPCC chose to make the report this length so they have to take the rap for including the errors. They could have excluded the errors for a shorter report.
Dumping the whole thing gets my vote.
He mentions the "going to be cold in Eastern Europe" as one vague statement.
Here's my favourite section - from the Summary for Policy Makers:
Does this mean anything at all?
More fires?
Fewer fires?
Bigger fires?
Bigger squirrels?
They chose the words: they could have written something that made sense but they didn't.
"Harold, a modern car has typically 15,000 components - and they all work. Every. Single. One."
Sep 3, 2010 at 10:30 AM | Jack Hughes
That'll be why you don't have things like garages, car servicing and product recalls then.
Bad analogy for what you wanted to say, inadvertantly a good one for describing the real world, and how any report of this length is going to have a couple of howlers in.
If a car leaves the showroom with a faulty radio, it doesn't invalidate the whole thing as a car. You lot claim the whole car is broken because you can't connect your MP3s.
Gee, I wish the IPCC would do product recalls. It's not so much that they make these errors, but their arrogant and dismissive attitude towards people who point out the errors
ZedBeat
The other day you claimed there were huge number of scientific publications purportedly showing the reality of antropogenic global warming!?
The impression I got was that you have not read one single such paper. That is any paper really showing based on empirical observations the antropogenic part of global warming.
I give you that there are many publications dealing with the fact that global warming (GW) has occured since the little ice age. But it is the A in AGW that is i question. Were you not aware of that?
ZDB - A classic attempt to deflect legitimate criticisms by minimising the claim. What infests the IPCC report are not 'a couple of howlers'. If it were just that we'd not worry. The thing is, in a number of major areas, just plain wrong, and it's admitted that. These are serious errors, which even more damningly were pointed out as part of the review process, but this was deliberately ignored. So, not just a couple of howlers, but incorrect science and badly flawed process together with partisan authorship and political interference. In short, an excellent example of shoddy workmanship which, to continue the motor trade analogy, is best described as the Austin Allegro of science, complete with square steering wheel.
Jack Hughes: I hope it does mean larger squirrels. Very popular in restaurants up here are squirrels!
Oh dear, why is it constantly necessary to repeat the facts. The Glacier melt date was not simply an error, it was deliberately included to increase the impact of the report. The "error" was after all picked up during the review process by at least two of the reviewers but it still went into the final version..
"Oh dear, why is it constantly necessary to repeat the facts. The Glacier melt date was not simply an error, it was deliberately included to increase the impact of the report. The "error" was after all picked up during the review process by at least two of the reviewers but it still went into the final version.."
Sep 3, 2010 at 11:59 AM | Arthur Dent
Hur hur hur - 'facts'.
So the IPCC deliberately included a clearly wrong and easily disprovable claim in the report. Then downplayed it, only mentioned it once and missed it out of the recommendations for policymakers? This was their cunning plan to increase the impact of the report?
You've really convinced me there Arthur.
The leaders of the IPCC are the kings of denial.
And their faithful minions are living in denial.
When your friends tell you you are out of control and offer friendly helpful advice about not drinking and driving, and your excuse is that you already have the keys and put on your coat, but you will really consider their advice at the next little get together, you really are out of control.
The car wreck of AGW will be gruesome fun to watch.
Re: ZDB
The statement you reference from martyn ("Disband the IPCC or not we won’t get a credible IPCC type report until we get credible science to report!") makes no mention of the "climate science" in any country. It neither criticizes nor extols them. This is about the IPCC which is a body that does not perform any climate research whatsoever. The IPCC is supposed to produce a report accurately reflecting the state of "climate science". This is something that it fails to do. Instead it produces a report with many inaccuracies, over states the confidence in results, ignores or downplays papers the IPCC authors disagree with, relies on gray literature produced by bodies with a vested interest and, in at least one instance, falsifies results.
Roger Harrabin Notes: (30th August)
I imagine some 'alarmist' are goingto give the BBC grief over this...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11131399
"The IAC will receive much support for its demand that the IPCC deals with scientific uncertainty in a better way. I had not noticed, for instance, that the three working groups of the panel's 2007 climate science assessment (known as AR4) used different measures of uncertainty. Some might question why this not rectified at the time.
The report is particularly scathing on the uncertainty issue - take this from comments on Working Group II (one of the sections of the IPCC's 2007 report): "Authors 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."
On the whole a very positive article from the BBC, acknowledging IPCC faults, etc agreeingthat the critics have largely been correct on that faults of the IPCC's processes, etc..
Some disapointement the first sentence though: I do take issue with this:
"If you're one of the clan which holds that climate change was invented by green liberals to trample on individual liberty, you'll be disappointed that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is still alive and kicking after its blunder on Himalayan glaciers."
Some people claim this of MAN MADE climate change.... (not climate change - natural)
Please say MAN made climate change when this is what you are talking about, and are discuss reducing man made CO2 emmisions because of it.
Personally, I do not believe this green liberal idea.
The evidence seems to suggest that a smaller group of scientists really believed the harm being caused, and became activists pushing public policy, rather than dispassionate scientists.A few other groups may have jumped on the bandwagon, with other agenda's.
I do not believe any of the 'political' conspiracies, yet I would be labbelled a 'massive sceptic',
Thus a simple, human nature explanation of a mass popular delusion. Human history is littered with other such example, where an idea become so ingrained in a culture, against evidence. Until such a time when the bubble bursts and the idea is left behind. No conspiracies, no scam's, hoaxes, no organised campaign.
However to be fair to Roger, imagine you are a BBC environmental analyst, and for 20 years the scientists, the chief science advisors, the Royal Society, the IPCC, Al Gore, All the UK politicians, all the 'caring' green groups, have been saying scientific proof that AGW is harming the planet. vs in the last few years, a small group of bloggers and 'bloody' minded people that ask a few question, and keep asking them... Who would you have gone with initially..
Until November, I would have been a 'concerned lukewarmer' bit sceptical on the more catastrophic stuff, but happy to go along with the idea that something should be done. And I have not been lobbied to death, as I imagine an environmental analyst at the BBC would have been.
Roger Harrabin Again:
"But in many ways the IAC report looks like more of a triumph for those "outsider" critics sometimes seen as enemies by "insider" climate scientists.
This is because the IAC has accepted many of what the outsider critics have said about the way official climate science is governed.
And when you see those criticisms spelled out in the way the IAC has done, you might wonder why the IPCC has not been more able to reform itself. "
AND:
"Future reports will surely have to be more clear on this - and the IAC wants transparent guidelines on suitability to be drawn up.
This drive for transparency will have to stretch to agreement and disagreement on findings, too. Future reports will have to be careful to detail a range of reputable views - something the Chinese government demanded immediately after the "Glaciergate" affair."
"Clearly, none of this is relevant to the 5th Assessment due to be published in 2013-2014: too much work has been done to make major changes at this stage, with author teams already in place." Complete nonsense of course. To my mind 2013-2014 is 3 to 4 years away. If this was organised by a private company, a new set of guidelines and authors etc could be put in place in a matter of weeks. The problem with academics and other government organisations is that they are not used to working to real deadlines. Just think how quickly things were organised in WW2.
I believe that you scientists should practise what you preach and it is not happening.
There have been many calls for true scientific procedure.... hypothesis...test it in the real world.....if proven right then develop the hypothesis and do more tests, if proven wrong then find a new hypothesis.
1) CO2 has a direct warming effect on the climate.
2) CO2 has a further indirect effect on other feedback effects such as water vapour which cause more warming.
3) Current warming is unprecedented and dangerous.
Can we test these in the real world? No need because it has already been done so you can ditch all those models, we dont need them.
The four interglacial warm periods before the current Holocene are perfect for the job. Similar rates of warming to the Holocene but a (so far) higher peak teperature than the Holocene.
The higher peak temperature in all these Interglacials conveniently gets rid of hypothesis number 3.
Hypotheses 1 & 2 are both tested in conditions as close to today as you could wish for.
Both hypotheses are proved wrong.
CO2 and whatever direct and indirect effect it has continued long after the world began to cool (as much as 2500 years). Significantly the world did not warm again for 100.000 years.
Will someone therefore explain to me why any of the CURRENT SCIENTIFIC HYPOTHESES in the IPCC reports are worth the paper they are printed on?
Nero only fiddled while Rome burned, the IPCC could end up fiddling while the planet freezes.
To correct my previous post:
"Both hypotheses are proved wrong."
I do not dispute CO2 having a direct warming effect starting from low levels of CO2 ppm. However at current temperatures and ppm it is shown to have maxed out and become irrelevant.
The secondary effect is shown to be insignificant or even maybe negative.
Dung,
We are in the age of CO2, and all issues and questions are solved by agreeing, in the minds of believers, the answer "CO2".
Chitty Chitty Bang Bust.
===============
Myles Allen?
Is this the same Myles Allen who co-founded ClimatePrediction.net? Its much published result was the earth heating up by 11C this century! Even RealClimate complained about that!
Is this the same Myles Allen who participated with the BBC and the BBC programme Meltdown to get people at home to run climate prediction software? The software which had to be withdrawn due to a bug!
Is this the same Myles Allen who said at the Parliamentary Select committee that some amateur coder was commenting on the wrong code. Or was it actually a professional computer scientist who exposed badly written software as an example of the dreadful capability climate scientists have in writing and maintaining computer code!
And who precisely is listening to Myles Allen?
It is not possible for the IPCC process to regain the trust and authority it once (undeservedly) enjoyed. To do that would require a ship load of politically and environmentally dispassionate Star Trek Vulcans, and a very magnanimous public.The IPCC did what it was supposed to do. It almost worked, with relentless MSM support. Lawson was one of very few political heavyweights to oppose it. He published Appeal to Reason as one of the first, and Klaus a similar, expose. Both had to be ordered from overseas initially. But mainly down to the internet, the establishment in one short year have been forced severely on to the back foot, if not into headlong retreat. The latest inquiry dealing with the IPCC predictably promotes this vain attempt to restore its credibility.
The sheer bureaucratic inertia of the IPCC is staggering. They're still going to publish what will probably be more of the same in 3-4 years time? Holy smoke, as someone remarked when the vicar caught fire.
Cumbrian (11:24) i didn't get the allegro analogy, until these funny wiki lines: ... A commonly-given example of the Allegro's poor design is that it is more aerodynamic when travelling backwards than it is when going forwards. ... and: the Allegro is a horrible car in a more original way than the Marina (Clarkson)
ZedsDeadBed@12:09 behold the shear number the google results for "glaciers melting" (about 1,630,000 results). Some of the telling headlines:
Glaciers melting so fast, a generation will be too late - CNN
...EIS merges art and science to give visual voice to the planet's changing ecosystems
World's glaciers melting at accelerated pace, leading scientists ... [say]
Glaciologist says there is strong evidence of significant melting of glaciers due to a warming climate
Why Are Glaciers Melting?
The main culprit is thought to be global warming caused by industrial revolution
and even as late as july 2010:
Himalayan Glaciers Melting Faster Than Anywhere Else in World ...
The global community has to come together into the next Cancun and then decide about cuts
Bob Carter once used a good analogy. Something along the lines of,
A titanic, hit with many torpedos, refusing to sink.
This one from Morano's page must be shared
http://i1039.photobucket.com/albums/a477/kulaki/Cartoons/GorePachauriTheGigIsUp.jpg
Bill Sticker
Was it not the Bishop that caught fire?
Fear not we will not allow that to happen ^.^