13 ms·

there has been plenty of genuine scepticism from within the scientific community (as there should be). what has happened is that it has become politicized such

by modzu 7y ago

there has been plenty of genuine scepticism from within the scientific community (as there should be). what has happened is that it has become politicized such that the science is suffering for fear of being labeled a heretic. much of the research is published via the intergovernmental panel on climate change; well it's right there in the title. none of this is to say that there aren't also entities pushing propaganda (exxon, etc)

logjammin 7y ago
Example of investigators whose work has suffered for fear of being labeled a heretic?
- modzu 7y ago
  Freeman Dyson
  - scotty79 7y ago
    He's a physicists. Why would he have any idea about climate? He's just a person with an opinion not a dissenting scientist. And if his work suffered as a result of voicing such opinion then it was only to be expected. If you voice stupid opinion regarding domain you know almost nothing about and prop it up with your work reputation it's only fair if that reputation takes a hit.
    - Youcandothis 7y ago
      The climate is a physical phenomenon.
      - kaybe 7y ago
        And many climate scientists are in fact physicists.
      - scotty79 7y ago
        Everything in existence is a physical phenomenon. That doesn't mean physicists have authority on everything. You might as well consider every philosopher an authority on everything because every problem ever solved was solved by thinking and that's what philosophers do. While in reality philosophers are only authorities on (the history of?) philosophy.
        modzu 7y ago
        that's too harsh. philsophers are experts at a particular way of thinking: logic. it is surprisingly powerful for clarifying ideas and advancing knowledge, in much the same way as mathematics or the scientific method are. we would not say mathematicians are only experts on "numbers"
        scotty79 7y ago
        Logic is actually part of math. There are even few different logics math worked out. Some philosophers follow logic but apply it to unanswerable questions. Some can't even do the logic part rigorously enough. Personally I have no respect for this field of culture and humans that pursue it. All of them are not even wrong.
    - maxlybbert 7y ago
      The “97% consensus” number is based on surveys of scientists in general, not just climate scientists. Including scientists when they agree with a position, but not when they disagree (because they aren’t real climate experts) is a very strange debate tactic.
      - esailija 7y ago
        Well, everything you said is false: "Among the most-cited is a 2013 study of nearly 12,000 abstracts of peer-reviewed papers on climate science published since 1990, of which just over 4,000 papers expressed an opinion on the cause of recent global warming. Of these, 97% agree, explicitly or implicitly, that global warming is happening and is human-caused."
        maxlybbert 7y ago
        It looks like you’re right.
- akvadrako 7y ago
  One of the more famous cases recently was Peter Ridd. He just won a court case against his university after being sacked for questioning the climate consensus.
  - kaybe 7y ago
    He said the Great Barrier reef will profit from climate change and not die off because of it, is that the issue you mean? Sooo - if it's true, great, one problem less! Regardless, there are still many other problems caused by climate change that he did not dispute and that we still have to fight. So the best course forward is still to reduce emissions, and keep an eye on the reef to see what's true. --- Googling around I found the statement that “Dr Ridd was not sacked because of his scientific views. Dr Ridd was never gagged or silenced about his scientific views, a matter which was admitted during the court hearing.” [0] (But if that's true or not.. hard to say from here. The court recordings would have evidence.) [0] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/16/james-cook-university-professor-peter-ridds-sacking-ruled-unlawful https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/16/james-co...
adrianN 7y ago
Unless you literally don't believe the raw numbers coming from sensors all over the world there is no room for doubting that the climate is changing. There can, and has been, plenty of discussion as to the reasons, but for at least thirty years now the consensus has been that human activity is responsible for the vast majority of the effects we've seen.
- modzu 7y ago
  um, "climate changing" is uncontroversial. the question that science is trying to answer, is "why". one hypothesis being fossil fuel emissions. you will note even the IPCC does't claim to have a definitive answer. yet a bunch of programmers and entrepreneurs on HN have no doubts.
  - adrianN 7y ago
    So what's your gripe with "climate change" being in the name of the IPCC?
    - modzu 7y ago
      sorry it wasnt clear from my comment, but mainly that a governmental panel == politicized, and also that the IPCC reports to the UNFCCC, whose mission is to "stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic (human-induced) interference with the climate system". in other words, it assumes the hypothesis that the science should be testing
      - adrianN 7y ago
        Yeah well the UNFCCC is from the nineties. By then the consensus was already there that anthropogenic GHG emissions are the culprit.
      - tzs 7y ago
        It's not a hypothesis. That greenhouse gases affect heat retention can and has been directly observed. That the rise in greenhouse gases is mostly human-induced can also be pretty directly shown by isotope analysis, which can distinguish CO2 that comes from burning fossil fuels or burning forests from other CO2 sources.
rmellow 7y ago
The fact you are being downvoted really makes the case that any dissent on climate change makes you a heretic. And before I'm downvoted, note that you don't know my position on climate change: all I'm against is punishing people for genuine disagreement of thought.
- mikestew 7y ago
  all I'm against is punishing people for genuine disagreement of thought. I'll down vote you for the straw man. You have no idea why parent is being down voted, but a top runner on my list of guesses is that "scientists want to disagree, but they don't for fear of speaking up" is a pretty weak argument.

by modzu 7y ago

logjammin 7y ago

Example of investigators whose work has suffered for fear of being labeled a heretic?

modzu 7y ago
Freeman Dyson
- scotty79 7y ago
  He's a physicists. Why would he have any idea about climate? He's just a person with an opinion not a dissenting scientist. And if his work suffered as a result of voicing such opinion then it was only to be expected. If you voice stupid opinion regarding domain you know almost nothing about and prop it up with your work reputation it's only fair if that reputation takes a hit.
  - Youcandothis 7y ago
    The climate is a physical phenomenon.
    - kaybe 7y ago
      And many climate scientists are in fact physicists.
    - scotty79 7y ago
      Everything in existence is a physical phenomenon. That doesn't mean physicists have authority on everything. You might as well consider every philosopher an authority on everything because every problem ever solved was solved by thinking and that's what philosophers do. While in reality philosophers are only authorities on (the history of?) philosophy.
      - modzu 7y ago
        that's too harsh. philsophers are experts at a particular way of thinking: logic. it is surprisingly powerful for clarifying ideas and advancing knowledge, in much the same way as mathematics or the scientific method are. we would not say mathematicians are only experts on "numbers"
        scotty79 7y ago
        Logic is actually part of math. There are even few different logics math worked out. Some philosophers follow logic but apply it to unanswerable questions. Some can't even do the logic part rigorously enough. Personally I have no respect for this field of culture and humans that pursue it. All of them are not even wrong.
  - maxlybbert 7y ago
    The “97% consensus” number is based on surveys of scientists in general, not just climate scientists. Including scientists when they agree with a position, but not when they disagree (because they aren’t real climate experts) is a very strange debate tactic.
    - esailija 7y ago
      Well, everything you said is false: "Among the most-cited is a 2013 study of nearly 12,000 abstracts of peer-reviewed papers on climate science published since 1990, of which just over 4,000 papers expressed an opinion on the cause of recent global warming. Of these, 97% agree, explicitly or implicitly, that global warming is happening and is human-caused."
      - maxlybbert 7y ago
        It looks like you’re right.
akvadrako 7y ago
One of the more famous cases recently was Peter Ridd. He just won a court case against his university after being sacked for questioning the climate consensus.
- kaybe 7y ago
  He said the Great Barrier reef will profit from climate change and not die off because of it, is that the issue you mean? Sooo - if it's true, great, one problem less! Regardless, there are still many other problems caused by climate change that he did not dispute and that we still have to fight. So the best course forward is still to reduce emissions, and keep an eye on the reef to see what's true. --- Googling around I found the statement that “Dr Ridd was not sacked because of his scientific views. Dr Ridd was never gagged or silenced about his scientific views, a matter which was admitted during the court hearing.” [0] (But if that's true or not.. hard to say from here. The court recordings would have evidence.) [0] https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/16/james-cook-university-professor-peter-ridds-sacking-ruled-unlawful https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/16/james-co...

adrianN 7y ago

Unless you literally don't believe the raw numbers coming from sensors all over the world there is no room for doubting that the climate is changing. There can, and has been, plenty of discussion as to the reasons, but for at least thirty years now the consensus has been that human activity is responsible for the vast majority of the effects we've seen.

modzu 7y ago
um, "climate changing" is uncontroversial. the question that science is trying to answer, is "why". one hypothesis being fossil fuel emissions. you will note even the IPCC does't claim to have a definitive answer. yet a bunch of programmers and entrepreneurs on HN have no doubts.
- adrianN 7y ago
  So what's your gripe with "climate change" being in the name of the IPCC?
  - modzu 7y ago
    sorry it wasnt clear from my comment, but mainly that a governmental panel == politicized, and also that the IPCC reports to the UNFCCC, whose mission is to "stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic (human-induced) interference with the climate system". in other words, it assumes the hypothesis that the science should be testing
    - adrianN 7y ago
      Yeah well the UNFCCC is from the nineties. By then the consensus was already there that anthropogenic GHG emissions are the culprit.
    - tzs 7y ago
      It's not a hypothesis. That greenhouse gases affect heat retention can and has been directly observed. That the rise in greenhouse gases is mostly human-induced can also be pretty directly shown by isotope analysis, which can distinguish CO2 that comes from burning fossil fuels or burning forests from other CO2 sources.

rmellow 7y ago

The fact you are being downvoted really makes the case that any dissent on climate change makes you a heretic. And before I'm downvoted, note that you don't know my position on climate change: all I'm against is punishing people for genuine disagreement of thought.

mikestew 7y ago
all I'm against is punishing people for genuine disagreement of thought. I'll down vote you for the straw man. You have no idea why parent is being down voted, but a top runner on my list of guesses is that "scientists want to disagree, but they don't for fear of speaking up" is a pretty weak argument.