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Climate modeling isn't pop sci, it's physics. Predicting the correct outcome of complex systems is hard or impossible and depends on a lot of assumptions and in
by cinntaile 5y ago
Climate modeling isn't pop sci, it's physics. Predicting the correct outcome of complex systems is hard or impossible and depends on a lot of assumptions and interactions that you have to properly account for, this stuff gets more refined over time. The general direction of the predictions hasn't changed though so ignoring that would still be unwise.
- loa_in_ 5y agoThe bad process began before we even conceived a notion of a global climate, and continues only because we're used to it. But continuing it still will change the global environment forever
- nostrebored 5y agoIt's unfalsifiable at its core. Predictions will continue to be alarmist and unmet. Modeling decades out is impossible for systems we do understand. For systems we don't -- like climate -- it's an exercise in confirmation bias.
- cinntaile 5y agoI don't really see how it's unfalsifiable. If you predict a certain outcome in the future and this doesn't come true then your prediction was wrong. The question is, are we really focusing on the right things here? Predicting trends is probably better than predicting outcomes. As you correctly alluded to, expecting accurate predictions for complex systems is actually too much to ask for and that's why I think it's important to look at the general direction that the models point to. Are these predicted trends from the 70s different from the predicted trends now? If they aren't, what arguments do we have to reject 50 years of modelling?
- freen 5y agoPerhaps for models of the future, but for historical predictions of the current climate, prior models have been astoundingly accurate, and if anything overly conservative in their predictions. What evidence do you have that leads you to believe that the models used now will have less predictive power than those of the past which had high predictive power?
- the-dude 5y agoModels show what you want them to show.
- cinntaile 5y agoWhat is it that you are implying here?
- the-dude 5y agoThat models are inherently biased. A model does not contain or produce 'truth'. A model will produce what one is comfortable with.
- loopz 5y agoWhile getting to truth may be very helpful, most models just simulate observed facts and effects, to see if it is useful and can be validated. The point is not to predict, but to see how much variance different models can display, what one might learn from it and to evolve new models from that. What is comfortable or not shouldn't be a factor. In fact most climate scientists would search for any and all redeeming factors. It is concerning how insignificant they all seem to be. Major contrary findings would make great news, get prizes and grants. Timelines are indeed less useful and accurate, than levels of temperature and descriptions of accumulated and latent effects. Prediction is too hard and a sidetrack from all that is established peer-reviewed science so far.
- cinntaile 5y agoIt still feels like I have to read between the lines. What are you trying to say when you claim that (climate) models produce what you are comfortable with?
- the-dude 5y agoWhen models don't produce what one is comfortable with, it gets tweaked until it does.