Weather: Climate change science is under attack - once again!
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Skeptics have taken advantage of the recent revelations about climate change research to confuse the public about global warming – and lazy journalism has only contributed to the problem
by HENRY HENGEVELD
The latest series of challenges to the credibility of climate system research and reporting of trends in past climates began last November, a few days before the beginning of the international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen.
Unidentified hackers managed to access computer files of University of East Anglia researcher Phil Jones, steal more than 1,000 personal e-mail messages between him and other researchers within his department and elsewhere, and post these on the internet.
Most of these e-mail messages appear to have been relatively innocuous. However, some – obviously written in anger – were downright rude and dismissive about some of the skeptics who, they felt, had been inappropriately using their data and unfairly criticizing their work.
Other messages involved discussions between the scientists on methods for assimilating and analyzing climate data for trends, and for addressing errors or problems with the data – for example, those associated with urban heat island effects. Written between colleagues, they used a lot of jargon that, taken out of context, can easily be misinterpreted or misused by others to imply something quite different than intended.
Shortly after these e-mails were posted on the internet, blog sites began to report that there were several errors in the information provided in the assessment reports on climate change science released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2007. For example, the second report on impacts had incorrectly suggested that glaciers in the Himalayas could entirely disappear by 2035. While glacier experts involved in writing the first part of the assessment dealing with climate system science had caught this error and corrected it, the same correction had not been made in the second part of the report.
Climate change skeptics quickly claimed that the posted e-mails and the errors in the IPCC reports both indicated that the scientists involved in writing the reports – which are used as the scientific basis for negotiating climate change action plans – are guilty of evidence tampering and professional misconduct.
Tim Ball, a Canadian skeptic living in Victoria, went so far as to suggest that the e-mails are proof of "deliberate fraud" and the "greatest deception in history." A number of journalists, smelling controversy and the possibility of scandal, quickly scooped up related press releases prepared by skeptic groups and, often without even changing the wording, reiterated the accusations in opinion columns and news reports.
Not surprisingly, the science community was stunned by the inflammatory rhetoric about bad science appearing in the media and on internet blogs and websites, and hunkered down into a defensive mode.
The University of East Anglia declared that it would launch an investigation to look for any evidence of impropriety in the performance of its climate science team. The United Nations has also declared it would ask an independent assessment of the processes used by IPCC (which reports to the UN) in its assessments.
The American Association for Advancement of Science and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences held a special collaborative symposium in January of this year to grapple with the fallout from the accusations of skeptics. While participants acknowledged that there were indeed small errors in the IPCC reports, they found the claims by skeptics of improper scientific performance of researchers, such as Jones, to be largely unfounded.
Furthermore, others noted that Jones and his colleagues were only a few of the approximately 1,250 international scientific experts involved on a voluntary basis in writing the last IPCC report, and the 2,500 voluntary expert reviewers who provided some 90,000 review comments (all in the public record) that were meticulously addressed in the final editing of the report.
Finally, given that the IPCC report relied on 18,000 research studies covering a broad range of scientific information as the basis for their assessment, the fact that only a few errors were found suggests that the authors and reviewers did a remarkable job in reliably reporting the current state of the science.
Other prestigious international scientific associations, including the national science academies of 13 different countries, the American Meteorological Society and the Union for Concerned Scientists, have also followed suit with statements declaring their confidence in the information and conclusions provided in the IPCC reports.
These statements are indicative of the near world-wide unanimity between scientists actively conducting research into climate change science that the planet is warming due to human activities; that there is cause for grave concerns about related impacts in the decades and centuries to come; and that the need for mitigative action is "'indisputable."
Unfortunately, the accusations of bad science have been highly successful in confusing the public. An American opinion poll conducted in December 2009, for example, indicates that only 25 per cent of American adults surveyed believe that "most scientists agree on global warming," while 52 per cent thought that "there is significant disagreement within the scientific community." This public confusion has, in turn, helped to weaken American political resolve and impetus for action on climate change.
Part of the blame for this failure to communicate climate change science effectively to non-scientists lies with the science community itself, something I have written about in the past. However, the penchant for journalists to focus on topics involving controversy and confrontation, rather than consensus, is also a major factor. Indirectly, we as readers are to blame, too, since journalists need to titillate our interests in order for us to read their articles.
A number of years ago, I challenged a well-respected science writer for one of Canada's major daily newspapers about this tendency to focus on controversial details rather than the broader, less controversial picture. "If 98 per cent of a room full of 100 researchers come to an agreement on an important piece of scientific information, and two of these experts disagree, but with opposing views," I asked, "'why is it that a journalist will often tend to write about the disagreement between the two and ignore the agreement between the other 98?" "Henry," he replied, "that's where the story is!"
He also noted that, because of cost cutting and intense competition to be the first to get the scoop, few reporters for dailies now have the time or expertise to undertake good investigative journalism. Hence, they often accept the opinions of those they interview or press releases about new scientific analyses without verification.
A recent article published online by Canadian freelance journalist Chris Wood underscores the latter point. He notes that a number of Canadian newspaper opinion columns that appeared following the release of the purloined e-mail messages between Jones and colleagues echoed the rhetoric of skeptics almost word for word. He argues that, for any journalist to call human-induced climate change a proven hoax, given the overwhelming evidence otherwise, is "reckless endangerment" and "professional negligence." He concludes that the real scandal "isn't scientific, but journalistic."
Meanwhile, as the international political community continues to navel-gaze with respect to taking serious action on mitigating climate change, the world continues to change. Our hemisphere is now likely warmer than it has ever been in at least the past 1,300 years.
Sea ice in the North is melting at rates unknown in observational history, and glaciers and ice sheets are shrinking from Pole to Pole while sea levels rise. And that's just the beginning of what we expect to happen.
Time to pull our heads out of the sand! BF
Henry Hengeveld is Emeritus Associate, Science Assessment and Integration Branch/ACSD/MSC, Environment Canada.