In the “taking global warming on faith” thread, you were presented with a review of the collected body of work on global warming, and refused to read even the summary, noting that it was “an awfully long document.” And in that 18 page thread, you’ve offered exactly zero cites to peer-reviewed science that contradicts the AGW hypothesis.
I’m curious… just how do you propose to “evaluate the actual science” without ever having read it?
I lost the link to the report summaries but it probably can be found on NOAA website.
1960 - 1969
C. D. Keeling and J. C. Pales, Mauna Loa Carbon Dioxide Project, Report No. 3, pp. 183, 1965.
R. Revelle, chairman: W. Broecker, H. Craig, C. D. Keeling, and J. Smagorinsky, Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide, Report of the Environmental Pollution Panel President’s Advisory Committee, The White House, November 1965, 111-133, 1965.
1970 - 1979
Multiple Authorship, Report to the World Meteorological Organization on Station Networks for World-Wide Pollutants, by the Commission for Air Chemistry and Radioactivity (CACR) of the International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics (IAMAP) of IUGG, 1970.
C. D. Keeling and R. B. Bacastow, Impact of Industrial Gases on Climate, Energy and Climate, Report of Panel on Energy and Climate, R. Revelle, Chairman, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D. C., 72-95, 1977.
C. D. Keeling and P. R. Guenther, The Thermodynamic Ionization Constants of Carbonic Acid: Determination of Ratio of K1 to K2 from Measurements in Very Dilute Aqueous Solutions. SIO Reference Series No. 77-29, pp. 67, 1977.
P. R. Guenther, Laboratory Report: Seawater Equilibration Experiment No. 3.SIO Reference Series No. 78-14, pp. 72, 1978.
P. R. Guenther, Manometer Report I: Manometric Calibrations of Primary Reference Gases During 1969 and 1970. SIO Reference Series: No. 78-12, pp. 119, 1978.
P. R. Guenther, Manometer Report II: Manometric Calibrations of Primary Reference Gases and Internal Manometric Volume Calibrations During 1972. SIO Reference Series No. 78-13, pp. 59, 1978.
C. D. Keeling, The Influence of Mauna Loa Observatory on the Development of Atmospheric CO2 Research, in Mauna Loa Observatory 20th Anniversary Report, edited by J. Miller, National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, Special Report, pp. 36-54, 1978.
1980 - 1989
P. R. Guenther and C. D. Keeling, Manometer Report III: Manometric Calibrations of Primary CO2 Reference Gases During 1974. SIO Reference Series No. 81-19, pp. 71, 1981.
P. R. Guenther, Manometer Report IV: Internal Manometric Volume Ratio Calibrations During 1974. SIO Reference Series No. 81-29, pp. 41, 1981.
R. B. Bacastow, C. D. Keeling, et al., Scripps Reference Gas Calibrating System for Carbon Dioxide in Air Standards: Revision of 1981. A Report Prepared for the Environmental Monitoring Program of the World Meteorological Organization, pp. 33, 33, 1983.
R. B. Bacastow, C. D. Keeling, et al., Scripps Reference Gas Calibrating System for Carbon Dioxide in Nitrogen Standards: Revision of 1980. A Report Prepared for the Environmental Monitoring Program of the World Meteorological Organization, pp. 64, 1983.
C. D. Keeling, R. B. Bacastow, et al., Scripps Reference Gas Calibrating System for Carbon Dioxide in Air Standards: Revision of 1982. A Report Prepared for the Environmental Monitoring Program of the world Meteorological Organization, pp. 31, 1983.
C. D. Keeling, P. R. Guenther, et al., Scripps Reference Gas Calibrating System for Carbon Dioxide in Air Standards: Revision of 1983. A Report Prepared for the Environmental Monitoring Program of the World Meteorological Organization, pp. 66, 1984.
If that’s the case, then why do you bother to discuss the science with anyone in these threads?
Where did I say I’m more qualified than you?
And let me ask you this: Who knows more about climate science: Richard Lindzen or GIGObuster?
That depends on how strongly you interpret the term “consensus”. If you mean “a hypothesis that absolutely every scientist who isn’t an outright loony or crank accepts, as unquestioningly as they accept the Newtonian theory of gravity”, then I would maintain that there still isn’t a “consensus” on AGW.
Can you tell me what post that was? I searched for the word “awfully” and could not find it.
Even without reading every last word of “the actual science” (whatever that meas), it’s possible to come to a reasonable conclusion by reading arguments both for and against, thinking critically, and using common sense.
We can use the formulation from your own post. When (if ever) did a substantial or overwhelming majority of the world’s practitioners of climate science join ranks to support the AGW-CO2 hypothesis?
Well, you described yourself a few posts ago as “absolutely” qualified to evaluate the “actual science” on climate issues.
IME, even jshore, who has a PhD in physics and a couple decades of experience with computer modeling techniques as well as a long-standing interest in climate science, would hesitate to describe himself as “absolutely qualified” to evaluate it.
Either you must have hitherto-unsuspected expertise in climate science that jshore hasn’t got, or you have a more inflated estimate of your capabilities.
Have you read even the first word of “the actual science”? As in, published peer-reviewed research on climate issues?
I agree that it’s valuable to read “arguments” about science targeted to a popular audience, and ultimately that’s what most of us laypersons will have to end up relying on for our understanding of the issues. But I would not describe that as tantamount to “evaluating the actual science”.
Yes.
That’s his problem, not mine. I don’t recall ever offering an opinion as to whether jshore is qualified to evaluate anything.
Then I disagree with you about what “consensus” means. I would estimate (based partly on the publication of the IPCC’s First Assessment Report in 1990) that the hypothesis of AGW reached “substantial-majority” levels of credibility among researchers sometime in the 1980’s, but I would definitely not describe that as a “consensus”.
That’s exactly the opposite of what you proposed with this post (incidentally, that’s also the post where you first introduced the term “actual science” to this thread). In about an eighteen hours, you’ve made two claims:
[ul]
[li]We should look at the “actual science” (your own words) to draw our conclusions about anthropogenic global warming, and[/li][li]It’s possible to come to reasonable conclusions by reading other peoples’ arguments, without delving into the actual science.[/li][/ul]
These claims seem to me to be diametrically opposed to one another. Could you clarify for me exactly how you propose to evaluate claims of AGW?
I don’t recall his ever saying you did. What he said was that you evidently “feel more qualified than” he does to evaluate climate science (emphasis added). And indeed, from your own assertions that appears to be true.
The difference simply seems to be that jshore and you have different standards for what it means to be qualified to “evaluate actual science”.
Sure. Look at the context:
Otara: Is [Michael Crichton] saying we should ignore the consensus then? And if so what would we replace that with?
Me: I imagine he would say that we should look at the actual science.
See, the point is that one can evaluate AGW by looking at the arguments pro and con. This is better than simply accepting that there is a consensus and not considering the arguments on their merits.
I didn’t say that. What I said is this:
So one can consider the “actual science” without reading lots and lots of scholarly articles about AGW.
Clear enough?
If person X claims that he is more qualified than person Y, it follows that person X is implicitly evaluating person Y’s qualifications, no?
But AFAICT you never did claim to be more qualified than jshore. Nor did jshore ever say that you did make such a claim.
jshore simply deduced, from the fact that you asserted that you are “absolutely” qualified to evaluate the “actual science” on climate change and he has never asserted any such thing about himself, that you feel more qualified than he does in this regard. In other words, you evidently rate your ability to evaluate climate science research more highly than jshore rates his own.
Based on your statements so far, his deduction seems to be perfectly correct, and I don’t quite get what you’re objecting to about it.
Clear enough. Wrong, but clear.
I would say the “actual science” is the body of peer reviewed publications. I agree that you could begin to evaluate AGW by reading a literature review with the pros and cons, provided that the review you’re reading is also peer-reviewed and published in a reputable journal. I would then consider it “actual science,” even if it’s a synthesis of others’ work, rather than original research. I think you’d have to rely at some point on those reviews, as there’s simply too much work to go through an article at a time.
But when you start reading pro and con articles that haven’t been reviewed, you’re getting nothing more than one author’s opinion. There’s no assurance that his opinion is supported by any actual evidence, that he’s interpreting past studies correctly, or even that he’s not just making shit up off the top of his head. Opinion articles are great for a lot of things - movie and music reviews, political statements, declarations of love, etc. But they’re next to worthless when it comes to evaluating science.
In short, your conclusion is only going to be as good as the sources you base it on. If you come to a conclusion on a scientific theory based on articles written by pop-culture authors, you’re more likely to be wrong than somebody who bases their opinion on scientific publications.
I didn’t read his statement that way. But if he was saying that my opinion of my own qualifications is higher than his-self opinion, it’s certainly possible he is correct.
Anyway, if he feels unqualified to evaluate AGW, then perhaps he should stop making scientific arguments on internet discussion boards.
You can define it any way you like.
How about this: Give me a canonical bibliography that you feel is necessary to evaluate AGW. We’ll see who in this thread has read it.
Did you even read the entire post? I bolded the relevant part here for you…
So yeah, I’m betting nobody in this thread - hell, probably nobody in the world - has read every relevant article on climate change research. But if you’re relying on speeches given to the National Pres Club for scientific information, you’re doing your research in the wrong library, and your conclusions will show it.
Kimstu correctly deduced what I was saying.
Well, that would sure save me a lot of time! 
At any rate, I think I have noted before that I try to more explain the science than make my own independent scientific judgements, although obviously my own opinion are going to creep into it.
However, my point is not that one should never discuss and argue about things that one is not an absolute expert on but rather that one should have a realistic assessment of one’s own ability to form independent judgements, especially when those judgements are at odds with those who have much more expertise than you.
And, on a more basic level, I don’t understand the prescription that you gave that “I imagine he would say that we should look at the actual science.” The whole concept of having bodies like the National Academy of Sciences was to get expert scientific opinions on scientific issues. Are you proposing that we just throw all that out the window and when we, or more importantly policymakers, want to decide what the state of the science is on an issue, they/we simply look on the internet a bit and then go with whatever scientific arguments seem most compelling to us?
Fine, so you agree that I don’t need to read every last article on climate change research.
What exactly do I need to read to be able to evaluate AGW, in your view?