Derek Lowe weighs in on the science underlying publicly funded AGW research, and contrasts it against that used for privately funded pharmaceutical research:
I want to comment on are the problems with the data and its analysis. I have deep sympathy for the fellow who tried to reconcile the various poorly documented and conflicting data sets and buggy, unannotated code that the CRU has apparently depended on. And I can easily see how this happens. I’ve been on long-running projects, especially some years ago, where people start to lose track of which numbers came from where (and when), where the underlying raw data are stored, and the history of various assumptions and corrections that were made along the way. That much is normal human behavior. But this goes beyond that.
Those of us who work in the drug industry know that we have to keep track of such things, because we’re making decisions that could eventually run into the tens and hundreds of millions of dollars of our own money. And eventually we’re going to be reviewed by regulatory agencies that are not staffed with our friends, and who are perfectly capable of telling us that they don’t like our numbers and want us to go spend another couple of years (and another fifty or hundred million dollars) generating better ones for them. The regulatory-level lab and manufacturing protocols (GLP and GMP) generate a blizzard of paperwork for just these reasons.
But the stakes for climate research are even higher. The economic decisions involved make drug research programs look like roundoff errors. The data involved have to be very damned good and convincing, given the potential impact on the world economy, through both the possible effects of global warming itself and the effects of trying to ameliorate it. Looking inside the CRU does not make me confident that their data come anywhere close to that standard.
No, but it’s all too common in publicly funded enterprises, alas. Scientific and otherwise. Not that government labs can’t or don’t do good work. They absolutely do, even if they sometimes do so without cost as a primary constraint or independent variable.
But most of these labs make tangible things; hardware, widgets, and software. Others try to understand the universe as a way of extending the human body of knowledge, hopefully with a practical application at some point.
It seems evident to me that the CRU folks got the policy cart so far out in front of the scientific horse until they could not easily remember which was which.
For doing so they were rewarded quite handsomely.
And, from Other People’s Money, [Bill Coles]: Can I speak frankly?
[Lawrence Garfield]: No. Lie to me! Tell me how thrilled you are to know me. I always speak frankly. I hate people who say, “Can we speak frankly?” It means they’re bullshittin’ me the rest of the time.
Lex … I’m reassured, at least, that the Wall Street Journal is behaving like a real newspaper, and covering Climategate in fair detail. There are two opinion pieces in today’s Journal on Climategate, even though the White House, in the person of its press secretary, assures everyone who will listen that “there’s nothing to see here. Move on.” I think the scandal is acquiring more legs, what with Australia and New Zealand chiming in, and four Australian legislators resigning over their Legislature trying to push through AGW climate warming validation legislation.
Good on them. I do love the Ozzies. They’re like we were back in the 1940s. Can you imagine any of our Congressmen resigning over an ethical issue today?
Marianne
Not voluntarily or out of the purity of their hearts. ;(
It is getting harder and harder for me to be positive about our political/cultural condition. Please 2010 hurry up and turn out in the way our country deserves.
Please 2010 hurry up and turn out in the way our country deserves.
Yep. But please understand that would be a necessary but not sufficient step.
I do. It is just that I see enough tangible events to make me see think/believe/hope that a meaningful change is possible next year politically. If not, pitchforks ain’t off my radar.
It seems to me that the entire basis of Christianity is to appeal to God’s mercy to save us from what we deserve.
PITCHFORKS!
The data involved have to be very damned good and convincing, given the potential impact on the world economy, through both the possible effects of global warming itself and the effects of trying to ameliorate it.
If the purpose of the research was to provide information for a basis to determine a course of action, you’d be right. If the idea of the research was to provide validation for a pre-determined course of action, you’d be wrong.