A review of the literature by Naomi Oreskes, also reported on here found no peer-reviewed literature that does not, at least implicitly, accept there there is indeed, a consensus among bonafide climate scientists. Granted the review was limited to papers that appeared in a search on the terms "global climate change." Although a bigger pool of literature might conceivably present exceptions - it is unlikely to alter the conclusion that there is a general consensus, even if there is disagreement on more specific questions of magnitude and consequences. This view is routinely challenged by climate skeptics, most recently by one Benny Peiser, who, to "prove" a lack of consensus, came up with an additional 34 papers that, he claims, do not accept that there is a consensus, and disagrees with the interpretation of most of the 928 papers reviewed by Oreskes. Abstracts to the additional 34 papers have been posted by Tim Lambert here), and demonstrate only that Peiser is ignorant of the difference between consensus and uncertainty, and of differences between studies of the climate itself, and studies of climate change policies [Pinging Dale Rothman!]. Only one of the additional papers he lists, by a committee of the Association of Petroleum Geologists, actually rejects the consensus view, and does not appear to have been peer reviewed outside that Association.

A few basics: Consensus is a collective judgement that is made to support a policy decision, based on what evidence is available at the time. This is necessary precisely because of unavoidable uncertainty, without which there would be no need to even make a decision. As Oreskes herself points out, a consensus can be wrong. Science doesn't actually prove anything. But, if done with integrity, a consensus pools the best scientific knowledge that we have, and, in this case, reflects a value judgment that it is preferable to avoid catastrophic climate change, and is based on the assumption that this should be the goal of policy. To challenge such a consensus, or the quality of the data upon which it is based, one has to follow the rules of the science game, as was suggested by Oreskes in reply to an inquiry from Chris Mooney. In other words, present actual evidence that disproves it, using the same technical definition of the problem in question, and subject it to peer review. Or else limit debate values and priorities, preferably under the rule of law and agreement about what those rules are - but I digress.

If Peiser's objective was just to generate a soundbite that creates doubt, he was successful and none of this matters - to those who share his perspective. His "review," which was rejected by the journal Science where the Oreskes review was reported, was instead reported in the Telegraph in an article that makes the charge that " leading scientific journals are censoring debate on global warming." In other words, he is playing a different game altogether, using a technical scientific debate as a stooge for a difference in values and priorities that doesn't sell very well in the marketplace of public opinion. For the rest of us, it is simply a case of fraud.

Funny that the 34 additional abstracts should include papers by Simon Shackley and Brian Wynne et al, many of which I have actually read, though not in awhile. This brings us back to the subject of STS. This group does indeed criticize what have been the dominant approaches to climate modeling because they obscure all of the inherent uncertainties. However, this is simply to support an argument that dialogue and social learning can be enhanced by making uncertainties and value judgments more explicit. Obscuring uncertainty also reinforces a technocratic approach to climate policy because it creates expectations that science has the capacity to predict and control complex systems - which makes science vulnerable to the kinds of baseless charges made by Benny Peiser - but see also this article by George Monbiot, who actually tried to track down the sources of some data cited by an otherwise reputable botanist to support a claim that 89% of glaciers are advancing rather than retreating.

However, even using good data without any typographical errors, with a careful framing of a problem in narrow technical terms, it is not hard to order up a scientific study, or even perhaps a committee report, that backs up a particular policy agenda. Or cherry pick a study to support a careful framing of the problem. Mutual reinforcement and consistency between ideas from different fields of inquiry plays an important role in validating knowledge - and have historically played a key role in providing legitimacy for controversial policy decisions. Conversely, science policy only becomes controversial when they fail to provide each other with this kind of mutual reinforcement. The best known example is the use of Darwin's theory of evolution to reinforce concepts of neo-classical economics and social Darwinism. But Darwin's views on the relationships between population pressure on resources, competition and the division of labor were also influenced by the dismal social conditions of his era, at the beginning of the industrial revolution, and by his reading of Malthus. Subsequently, as described by Philip Mirowski, when new theories of sociobiology were cited as evidence that people do sometimes reverse their preferences, thereby disconfirming deterministic assumptions about human behavior found in neoclassical economics, economists turned to behavioral experiments on rats using Skinner boxes, to determine "demand curves for animal consumers." This was after these kinds of experiments had been discredited in their own field, of behavioral psychology. In a further departure, the field of ecology moved away from the notion that it is possible to achieve a stable equilibrium, which once reinforced the notion that it is possible to return to an idyllic past that never really existed, or, as is explained by Jerry Ravetz in the next post, that if science just provides the true facts, we would get the right policy decisions.

In another paper, Shackley et al (1996) suggest that science and society are becoming unglued because of the breakdown in this previous mutual construction. Hmmm. Perhaps this is the reason Pat Robertson suggests that there is currently a gradual erosion of the consensus that's held our country together over the past 400 years? Robertson blames this on "an out-of-control liberal judiciary" that he regards as "worse than Nazi Germany, Japan and the Civil War." It is always unsettling to have one's world view challenged. But as we can see, this kind of mutual reinforcement can also sustain lies, by making them seem like the truth. As is explained by "Senator Roark" - a character in the film Sin City, maintaining a lie therefore requires that one tell more lies to achieve such consistency, and get others to go along with the story that is fabricated, who then develop a vested interest in perpetuating it, lest their own lies become exposed:

Senator Roark: Well, let me tell you a thing or two about power! Power doesn't come from a badge or a gun. Power comes outta lying and lying big and getting the whole damn world to play along with you. Once you got everybody agreeing with what they know in their hearts ain't true, you got' em trapped. You're the boss. You can turn reality on it' s head and they' ll cheer you on. You can make a saint out of a gibbering nut case like my high and mighty brother. You can beat your wife to death with a baseball bat like I did and leave your fingerprints all the hell over it and a dozen witnesses will swear on a stack of bibles you were a thousand miles away.

There's what, maybe five hundred people in this hospital? Five hundred people and every blessed one of them would hear it if I was to pump you full of bullets. I could be standing here laughing and holding a smoking gun and I wouldn't even be arrested. I wouldn't even be arrested. I wouldn't have to say a word. They' d cover it up for me, without me even asking them to! Lies. They'd all lie for me. Every one of them who counts. They'd have to. Otherwise all their own lies - everything that runs Sin City - it all comes tumbling down like a pack of cards.

Source: Frank Miller - That Yellow Bastard (Sin City, Book 4)

So, to wrap this up, for now, science is a set of rules. To have a meaningful debate over technical quality of science it is first necessary to agree on the definition of the problem and on what the objective is. Since it doesn't predict the future, and absent a laboratory that recreates every last detail, can only be confirmed in retrospect, use of science in policy needs to rely on value judgments. Finding acceptable policies to protect the environment or to achieve any other goal is ultimately about resolving conflict. Unacceptable policies can always rely on the power of lies.

Unlinked reference:
Shackley, S., B. Wynne, and C. Waterton, 1996. Imagine Complexity - The past, present and future potential of complex thinking. Futures 28(3) pp. 201-225.

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Starting off kids with things like kindergarten science projects at an early age can help to prepare them for middle school science fairs, not to mention that with a sound grounding in science most kids will be better prepared for life in a world where science concepts like basic chemistry are becoming more and more important to understand.