========================================================================= Subject: Re: Solar output Re: Global warming/climate change: a new approach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970206.183501.587@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Thu, 06 Feb 1997 23:35:01 GMT References: <5das9m$sie@access2.digex.net> Robert Grumbine posted in part: > The fact that main sequence stars (which the sun is) get hotter/ >more luminous as they age is not subject to much dispute. The observational >ground includes examining star clusters for systematics of luminosity >with age. The theoretical ground is remarkably insensitive to the >method by which the sun obtains its energy. c.f., Chandresekhar, S. >_An Introduction to the Study of Stellar Structure_ 1939, and >Schwarzschild, M. _Structure and Evolution of the Stars_, 1958. Both >are available now from Dover. I think this assumes physical laws do not change over time. While I know of no evidence that they do, I am unsure how certain of this we can be for periods of billions of years. For example a slowly decreasing value of the gravitational constant g (which has been proposed in the past) could counteract the expected increasing luminosity as hydrogen is burned to form helium. I haven't seen much about variable g theories recently. Does anyone know why they seem to be out of favor? Also how accurately is the earth's past orbit known? Is it certain it was not significantly different billions of years ago? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970207.185700.309@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Fri, 07 Feb 1997 23:57:00 GMT References: <32F66926.7E7@xmission.com> Jim (msteitz) posted in part: >Incorrect. The forests would not be able to migrate fast enough, and >they would simply die where they stand, left behind by their fast-moving >climate. Generalist species such as weedy plants would probably spread >like wildfire as the native communities died off. This makes no sense to me. If climate change leaves populations of a species slightly outside the new natural range of the species this does not mean all individuals of the population will die at once. It just means the population will be unable to maintain itself over a long period of time perhaps because of competition from better adapted species. So the rate of climate change is not the only important factor. As long as the total change is not too great, the change can be instantaneous and species will still be able to gradually shift to their new natural ranges. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970207.195637.294@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Sat, 08 Feb 1997 00:56:37 GMT References: <5dbjta$bme@spool.cs.wisc.edu> Followup-To: sci.environment Michael Tobis responded in response to someone else. >: They are not validated codes, > ^^^^^^^^^ > >define, please. They certainly reproduce climate to a better extent >than a random model with the same number of tunable parameters. For >instance, they reproduce the seasonal cycle - a significant climate >change from the atmosphere's point of view (though a rapid oscillation >to the ocean, admittedly). To have any confidence in the results of a large complicated computer program one would at a minimum like to see it sucessfully run test cases covering the entire range of parameters for which you intend to use it. Furthermore the program should not have been tweaked to make the test cases come out correctly. Programs which attempt to predict the equilibrium climate of a 2*CO2 world satisfy neither criteria. The sole test case (1*CO2 world) does not cover the parameter range and furthermore the programs have been tweaked to make the test case come out right. Michael Tobis continued: >: and so their results are highly doubtful. > >They should certainly be taken with some skepticism, but they are >useful in many disciplines, from geology to weather prediction. >Why they should be treated as valueless in this instance seems >to boil down to people not enjoying the results, rather than to >any substantive criticism. Weather prediction codes are tested daily. Climate prediction codes can't be tested because we don't know what the answer should be. Some people find uncertainty so disturbing that they will ignore evidence showing their favorite source (astrology, religion, ideology, climate models etc) of the "truth" does not have all the answers. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970207.202525.317@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Sat, 08 Feb 1997 01:25:25 GMT Michael Tobis posted (a while ago) in part (replying to someone else): > > Oh, and by the way, if the evidence *did* show this, how would you expect > > fossil fuel interests to respond? > >This was somewhat off topic, but I asked it not to inquire how one >might wish they would react but how one might expect them to. >In particular, it would be naive not to expect that no segment >of the most severely impacted economic interests would succum to >the temptation to begin an irresponsible campaign of disinformation. > >I mention this from time to time so that people will carefully consider >whether their own information has not been cynically manipulated. In >practice a great deal of the public confusion on this issue is >deliberately orchestrated, often, I suspect, by people who do not >even believe what they are saying. It is obvious that fossil fuel interests have reasons to minimize the potential effects of adding CO2 to the atmosphere. However when I point out the equally obvious fact that climatologists have reasons to exaggerate both the effects of CO2 and the ability of climatology to predict these effects you and others get all bent out of shape. Do you believe climatologists are morally superior to Exxon executives and thus better able to resist temptation. By the way I have not noticed any great tendency among environmentalists (or others) promoting concern about global warming to sacrifice any of their own interests to do anything about it. What exactly are environmentalists willing to give up to reduce global warming (certainly not their hysterical opposition to nuclear power)? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Green fanaticism and Indian foolishness may starve millions From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970207.211155.298@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Sat, 08 Feb 1997 02:11:55 GMT References: <5daqsl$42n@spool.cs.wisc.edu> Michael Tobis posted: >In the American journalistic tradition, there is a sharp distinction >between reporting and editorial comment in the WSJ, indeed, probably >sharper than elsewhere. I saw an article (sorry, can't remember where) >detailing some of the excesses of their editorials, and alleging that >many of their reporters were embarassed to be associated with the >heavy ideological baggage of the editorial page. Let me point out that the reporting side of the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) has some ideological baggage of its own. Compared to say, the New York Times, it is noticeably biased in a partisan liberal democrat direction. Michael Tobis continued: >Indeed, their promotion of the IPCC witch-hunt and their constant >repetition of some of the weakest criticisms of predictions of >anthropogenic climate change put them in a class with Mr Limbaugh, >not with a responsible journal serving a (to say the least) influential >clientele. Nobody is perfect. To its credit the WSJ editorial page has published a number of articles on the mass child sex abuse hysteria (a modern day equivalent of the Salem witch hunts) which more "responsible" journals have ignored. In my view, helping free some completely innocent people from long prison terms makes up for quite a bit. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970211.104445.549@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1997 15:44:45 GMT References: <32FCE382.632B@xmission.com> <19970207.202525.317@watson.ibm.com> I posted: >> By the way I have not noticed any great tendency among >> environmentalists (or others) promoting concern about global warming >> to sacrifice any of their own interests to do anything about it. What >> exactly are environmentalists willing to give up to reduce global >> warming (certainly not their hysterical opposition to nuclear power)? >> James B. Shearer Jim (msteitz) responded: >We are willing to make any sacrifices necessary, the same that we ask of >others. Anybody that claims to be an environmentalist must practice what >they preach and not have double-standards. Such sacrifices will probably >reduced car use & higher gasoline prices (2 opposing effects), and >higher electrical and energy bills, but not by an unreasonable amount. >And conservation and energy efficiency could help to offset such costs. >We pay a lot in bills and at the pump for the very fossil fuel usage >that needs to be reduced. But in any case, we must not be so selfish as >to condemn future generations to costs far greater than those that would >be required of us to prevent it. > >I support nuclear power, when it is properly carried out with the >correct objectives. Solar and wind power are optimal. And of course, >energy conservation is best. You are misunderstanding my question. I am asking, what measures that the environmental movement would otherwise oppose, would they reluctantly accept, as part of a program to reduce global warming. For example environmentally unsound nuclear waste disposal. The items you list appear to me to be things the environmental movement would favor anyway, hence do not represent sacrifices. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970211.104815.236@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1997 15:48:15 GMT References: <5djat9$mln@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <5dbjta$bme@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <199702 I posted: >: To have any confidence in the results of a large complicated >: computer program one would at a minimum like to see it sucessfully >: run test cases covering the entire range of parameters for which >: you intend to use it. Michael Tobis responded: >At a minimum? And you post from IBM? I presume that isn't company >policy, as it's a remarkably ambitious criterion. The testing phase >for any contemporary isystems software would last quadrillions >of years. To clarify, by the entire range of input parameters I did not mean every possible input which is infeasible. I meant the test cases should be distributed throughout the entire parameter space rather than concentrated in some small corner of it. As for posting from IBM, I am posting as an individual, the views expressed are mine not IBM's. I posted: >: Furthermore the program should not have been >: tweaked to make the test cases come out correctly. Programs which >: attempt to predict the equilibrium climate of a 2*CO2 world satisfy >: neither criteria. The sole test case (1*CO2 world) does not cover >: the parameter range and furthermore the programs have been tweaked >: to make the test case come out right. Michael Tobis responded: >There is tweaking, but as I have explained before, the number of >free parameters in the models is far too small to account for >their actual reproduction of climate. And as others have explained >before, the seasonal cycle is, at least from the point of view of >atmospheric models, a braod spectrum of independent tests. Furthermore, >paleoclimate tests are conducted and tested against paleontological >records to the extent possible, and many aspects of climate change >have been clarified through this approach. This includes states >where the world had substantially more than 2x CO2. I don't see your point. The number of free parameters in the models is sufficient to generate a wide variety of 2*CO2 climates, while matching the current climate, thus making the models essentially worthless for predicting the 2*CO2 climate. As for the seasonal cycle, I am not impressed that the models can predict winter is colder than summer. Or do you mean something else? I posted >: Weather prediction codes are tested daily. Climate >: prediction codes can't be tested because we don't know what >: the answer should be. Michael Tobis responded: >Again, these are substantially the same product, and yes, we know exactly >what the seasonal cycle should look like, what sorts of weather appear where >when, and all we give the models are initial conditions. This amounts to >as rigorous a test as possible given the circumstances. It's also not >a trivial test at all. Weather prediction codes and climate prediction codes are not substantially the same product (in the sense that the ability of weather prediction codes to predict the weather says anything about the ability of climate prediction codes to predict the climate). Weather prediction codes can ignore any effects that do not act fast enough to substantially affect the weather in a few days. Climate codes can not. This includes things like sea surface temperatures, snow cover, sea ice cover which change slowly enough that changes can be ignored (or modeled very crudely) in weather prediction but not in climate prediction. It also means weather codes can use unstable numerical methods as long as they take longer than a few days to blow up. I imagine Tobis knows all this which makes me wonder why he keeps bringing up this red herring. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, it does not matter how strong or well tested the other links are. Similarly it is not sufficient to test part of a complicated computer model. Michael Tobis also posted: >Shearer continues to believe that GCMs exist only to predict the >response of climate to greenhouse gases, and that they exist somehow >separate from legitimate inquiry in climate science. Like most >sciences, computation is a central part of the process of gaining >and testing knowledge in the physics of climate. Fruitful feedback >between observational, theoretical and modelling aspects has dramatically >increased the level of understanding in the field. I believe that climate models have been largely funded in order to predict the response of climate to added CO2. I do not believe the more complicated models have much value added in this respect. Michael Tobis continued: >For instance, the inability of models to replicate a sudden-onset >glaciation is precisely what put the old worries about an imminent >"ice age" to rest in the 70's. Does Shearer find this a credible >use of GCMs, and if not, why not? This is different, if no plausible model can produce an effect, whether sudden-onset glaciation or runaway greenhouse, this is evidence against the effect. (Not conclusive, I believe continental drift was dismissed for years because of the lack of a plausible model.) Michael Tobis concluded: >Shearer's insulting insistence that GCMs are not tested or that they >are given too much credence by those that build them and use them >is not backed up by any evidence, and of course it can't be. It's >a matter of untested faith, like astrology or dogmatic religion or >ideology. Of course Tobis's opinion of economic models is similar to my opinion of climate models. I guess this just illustrates the proverb about the mote in your neighbor's eye (or maybe the proverb about whose ox is gored). James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970211.104927.504@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1997 15:49:27 GMT References: <5dje0v$mln@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <19970207.202525.317@watson.ibm.com> I posted: >: It is obvious that fossil fuel interests have reasons to >: minimize the potential effects of adding CO2 to the atmosphere. >: However when I point out the equally obvious fact that climatologists >: have reasons to exaggerate both the effects of CO2 and the ability of >: climatology to predict these effects you and others get all bent out of >: shape. Do you believe climatologists are morally superior to Exxon >: executives and thus better able to resist temptation. Michael Tobis responded: >I reserve comment on the first part of the question. I believe the >constraints and corrective methods of science are remarkably >effective in preventing physical scientists from substantially >misrepresenting their information or fooling themselves for any >significantly extended period of time. The constraint is that theories must match the actual physical world. If experimental verification or falsification of a theory is difficult or impossible scientists can and do fool themselves for extended periods of time. For example the relatively crude Piltown (sp?) man fossil fraud was undetected for 40 years. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970211.105119.808@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1997 15:51:19 GMT References: <32FE1172.5EAC8D6C@math.nwu.edu> <5dbjta$bme@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <1997 Len Evens posted: >Shearer has in the past made the statement that the computer models >don't tell us anything we didn't already know on the basis of very >simple models. I think he is wrong in that. In fact the computer >models probably tell us that things won't be as bad as some simple >arguments might suggest, for example. They also allow us to do long >runs and investigate in a loose sense the possibility of regime shifts >like changes in thermohaline circulation. In addition, there are a >large number of different kinds of models which address different >aspects of climate. I think this overstates my position a bit. I am willing to give some weight to the results of some computer models such as 1D RCM models. These models are only comparatively simple. What I question is whether the full GCM models, which attempt to model everything relevant to the equilibrium response to 2*CO2, add any value. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970211.160933.411@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Tue, 11 Feb 1997 21:09:33 GMT References: <5do6gv$mq5@news1.mnsinc.com> <19970207.202525.317@watson.ibm.com> I posted: : It is obvious that fossil fuel interests have reasons to : minimize the potential effects of adding CO2 to the atmosphere. : However when I point out the equally obvious fact that climatologists : have reasons to exaggerate both the effects of CO2 and the ability of : climatology to predict these effects you and others get all bent out of : shape. Do you believe climatologists are morally superior to Exxon : executives and thus better able to resist temptation. Rich Puchalsky responded: >A scientist's core duty is to discover and report the truth; a corporate >executive's core duty is to make money for shareholders. One of these >goals is more likely to lead to public truth-telling than the other. I will concede Puchalsky has a point here, the ethos of science is more committed to objective truth than that of business. I doubt that this makes all that much difference however. The ethos of their profession is just one factor of many influencing people's actions. Others would include self interest, personal religious and political views, personal ethical and moral values, popular opinion etc. Also the ethos of science and business are more diverse than Puchalsky indicates. Many doctors for example believe their primary duty is to their patients. This led many AIDS researchers to basically lie about aspects of AIDS because they felt the truth would hurt AIDS victims. Similarly some environmental scientists feel a duty to preserve and protect the environment. I also posted. : By the way I have not noticed any great tendency among : environmentalists (or others) promoting concern about global warming : to sacrifice any of their own interests to do anything about it. What : exactly are environmentalists willing to give up to reduce global : warming (certainly not their hysterical opposition to nuclear power)? Puchalsky responded: >Note the propaganda: > >1. "Environmentalists" have suddenly, according to Shearer, become a group > of people who all, or almost all, have the same beliefs. > >2. Environmentalist opposition to nuclear power is "hysterical", a classic > smear word without much inherent meaning. > >Even after stripping the propaganda away, what remains of the argument is >factually untrue. I have heard many environmentalists say that they support >nuclear power because of global warming concerns. Whether this represents >a "great tendency" or not I will leave to the propagandists, but it >certainly did not occur before this issue had started to be considered. Immediately after generalizing about the beliefs of scientists and business executives Puchalsky claims it is absurd to generalize about the beliefs of environmentalists. Of course environmentalists like scientists and business executives are a diverse group. Never- theless they tend to share certain beliefs such as opposition to nuclear power. Puchalsky objects to my characterization of this opposition as "hysterical". Would he prefer "vehement"? Obviously people didn't much use global warming as an argument in favor of nuclear power prior to global warming becoming an issue. This does not mean global warming is the reason these people support nuclear power. Some environmentalists have long supported nuclear power as less environmentally damaging than fossil fuel in general (and coal, the main US alternative, in particular) even without considering global warming effects. For example at one time (circa 1965?) the Sierra club supported nuclear power for this reason (before bowing to popular opposition). Would Puchalsky care to estimate what fraction of the environmentalists which support nuclear power believe it is less environmentally harmful than coal even ignoring global warming concerns? In any case the fact that a minority of environmentalists support nuclear power has about as much practical import as the fact that a minority of democrats oppose abortion rights or that a minority of republicans support legalization of marijuana. As for propaganda, is Puchalsky asserting that there is more propaganda in my posts than in his? Puchalsky concluded: >Shearer sometimes argues here about mathematics; often those posts get more >technical than I would like to pursue in my recreational time. But if his >mathematical arguments are anything like his verbal ones, than I would >advise others here to regard them with deep distrust. A flame about excessive technical content in sci.environment posts. Is this a first? As for Puchalsky's advice, I would advise that evaluating arguments by your opinion of the politics of the advocate is a dangerous, albeit tempting, practice which can lead to serious (not to mention embarrassing) errors. Should anyone doubt that Puchalsky's objections to my posting style is primarily political, I will remind them that Puchalsky has repeatedly defended Scott Nudds in this group. (Nudds has not posted to this group for a few months, he appears to be currently blessing comp.lang.c and comp.lang.asm.x86 with his views. Or you can find past sci.environment posts by Nudds using Deja News.) James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970212.195332.520@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Thu, 13 Feb 1997 00:53:32 GMT References: <01bc186b$63e74740$ca354fc6@beast> Sam McClintock posted: >In short, the current level of research is not beset so much by >constraints, but by goals to understand our impact on the atmosphere. >The climatologists/meteorologists should not be damned for whatever >inaccuracies their models have, but lauded and encouraged to finish the >work before our current global chemistry experiment gets out of hand. Goals should be realistic. Otherwise resources will be diverted from worthwhile projects with reasonable objectives and largely wasted attempting the impossible. Furthermore the failure to achieve overly ambitious goals may become obvious only after some costly fiasco. Consider any number of ill-fated software projects. Why should I laud people for working on models which are, in my opinion, so far beyond the state of the art that the models are worthless? Why should I encourage them to continue wasting their time and the government's money pursuing such work? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970213.221631.393@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Fri, 14 Feb 1997 03:16:31 GMT References: <5dsvdo$cr8@spool.cs.wisc.edu> I posted: : I don't see your point. The number of free parameters in : the models is sufficient to generate a wide variety of 2*CO2 climates, : while matching the current climate, thus making the models : essentially worthless for predicting the 2*CO2 climate. Michael Tobis responded: >I suppose that the first assertion needs to be made more precise, >but qualitatively I think this is far from true. The whole reason for >the infamous tuning of parameters is to get a model into a space which >resembles extant climate. This turns out to be rather difficult - >so for a given strategy in practice there is a narrow range of >parameterizations that work, starting from an initial estimate based >on prior knowledge of the relevant physics. It works out to a crude >gradient search, but I can report based on experience that given a >broad modelling strategy, the function from free parameters to modelling >error is smooth and has a clear local minimum, and no indication that >there are other useful configurations. You seem to be claiming otherwise. >On what basis? The problem here is that the free parameters in these models are generally not constants but instead are complicated (and unknown) functions of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Consider the earth's albedo for example. There are any number of choices for albedo as a function of CO2 which will match the current albedo but differ substantially in a 2*CO2 world. This leads to significant uncertainty in the temperature change expected in 2*CO2 world. The only way to eliminate this uncertainty is to somehow derive these functions. However this is beyond the state of the art. More complicated models may hide this uncertainty but they do not eliminate it. For example a model may compute albedo as a function of cloud distribution, snow cover and sea ice cover but these items are themselves functions of the CO2 content of the atmosphere. These items may themselves be expressed as functions of other items but this is not eliminating the uncertainty it is just moving it around (and perhaps obscuring it). I prefer simple models where the limitations are obvious instead of more complicated models which have obscured with complexity equally bad or worse problems. Michael Tobis continued: >(I leave out here the "flux-corrected" coupled models, which are more >difficult to defend. The coupled model on which I work eschews flux >corrections, which I think do in fact render a model useless for >studying conditions significantly different than today's, and very much >for the reasons Shearer seems to be advancing more generally.) > >If this is the basis of your argument, you need to defend it with >more than raw assertion. Does the "coupled" model you work with model the ocean and the atmosphere? If for example it just models the atmosphere and takes sea surface temperatures as given then it can not be used to predict the climate in a 2*CO2 world since there is no reason to believe sea surface temperatures will not change in a 2*CO2 world. If your coupled model does model both the ocean and the atmosphere, does it accurately reproduce today's climate? If not, it's hard to see why we would expect it to accurately predict changes in today's climate. Finally if you have a coupled ocean, atmosphere model which accurately reproduces today's climate without flux corrections or other arbitrary fudging why haven't this breakthrough been better publicized? Michael Tobis continued: >You acknowledge that an inability of the set of all GCMs to represent >a sudden-onset glaciation constitutes evidence. How would you regard >an inability of that set to represent a high-greenhouse-gas world >without substantial warming? This would be evidence (not conclusive) that substantial warming is likely. Assuming, as you indicted was the case for sudden-onset glaciation, a substantial and unsuccessful effort was made to produce such models (high-greenhouse-gas world without substantial warming). Are you asserting any such substantial effort has been made? In any case, I will remind you that, as I have previously stated, I accept on the basis of simple models that a 2*CO2 world is likely to be warmer (whether warmer means substantially warmer here depends on what you mean by substantial). Michael Tobis continued: >Suppose a set of non-flux-corrected atmosphere-ocean models is developed, >none of which shows significant climate disruption in any populated area >shy of 8x background? Would you accept this as evidence that there is >no imminent greenhouse problem? Why or why not? Would this be different >if all predict a sudden and diruptive regime change somewhere between 2x >3x? Why or why not? How would you treat a single outlier? Again this would be evidence. Outliers (assuming they are accepted as correct, ie based on reasonable assumptions and correctly implemented) substantially destroy the case. Now you are reduced to arguing about the probability distribution of the unknown parameters which is unlikely to be very convincing. Michael Tobis continued >Again, this is not the principal use of these models, but it is >not at all clear that the points on which the best models agree >(of the sorts which cannot be represented in back-of-the-envelope models) >have no value whatsoever in this application, which seems to be your claim. I am unaware that there are any points on which the best models agree which can not be obtained by simpler models (or be attributed to chance agreement among a small number of models). Michael Tobis continued: >However, it's not clear at this point what you are suggesting from a >practical point of view. Is it that all GCM work should be defunded, or >only that GCMs should never be funded from global change research funds >or that there should be some prohibition from running them with enhanced >CO2 and modern geography and land surfaces? I am suggesting that running the more complicated models (which include atmosphere, ocean, snow cover, sea ice cover, vegetation type etc) with enhanced CO2 has essentially no predictive value and that this should be made clear to all concerned. Michael Tobis continued: >You make a much stronger distinction between meteorology and climatology >than I think is warranted. It is true that it is possible to run weather >models which do not also function as climate models, but this has >not been done for some time. This is because weather models are being >run out far enough into the future in scientific and development >applications that a failure to represent seasonal changes would represent >a bias that can be eliminated. Obviously any weather model can be made into a climate model just by running it for hundreds of model years. Are you claiming that all current weather models would yield reasonable climate models (ignoring the fact that this would not be computationally feasible) if this were done. My understanding is otherwise. Sure a weather model may model seasonal effects in a crude way. For example a model might assume (based on the average of past observations) that the Gulf Stream off North Carolina in March will warm at the rate of x degrees per day. However this sort of adjustment is putting the current climate into the model. The model cannot be then validly used to predict the climate. Michael Tobis continued (some material deleted): >I wouldn't be much impressed either. I wish every computer and math literate >person would build a shallow water model, add a Coriolis force, watch >a Gulf Stream form, and try to tell me that the model means nothing. >(It's a fairly simple exercise.) ... Ok, what does the model mean? That a Gulf Stream is possible? There have been worries expressed in this forum that global warming could somehow cause the Gulf Stream to shut off with serious consequences. Does the model mean this is impossible? Some mathematical phenomena are surprising robust, recurring in similar form in the solutions of differing sets of differential equations. Are you claiming that something that looks like a Gulf Stream (or any of the other items you mentioned) will never occur in models which are not physically correct? Michael Tobis continued (some material deleted): >Comparison to economic models is moot, in my opinion. It's true that >climate models suffer from complexity, almost surely more so than do >economic models. But climate models can be tested against the known >physical principles they represent, while the principles of economics >remain speculative at best. I hope you are aware of George Soros' >cover article in the current Atlantic, in which he cogently argues, >among many other things, that no economic model can be as successful >as a physical model, because to the extent to which it is successful >it modifies the system to which it refers. I am aware of the article, I have not read it. The argument (as you give it above is faulty). It is true that economic systems may change in response to a model. It is not true this change will necessarily make the model less accurate. It may instead make the model more accurate. Consider for example the Black-Scholes options pricing model (which predicts the price options should sell for). It appears likely that the widespread acceptance of this model has caused buyers and sellers of options to expect prices near the Black-Scholes price making the model more accurate. In other words a widely accepted economic theory can be self-fulfilling. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970217.184711.697@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Mon, 17 Feb 1997 23:47:11 GMT I posted: > Weather prediction codes and climate prediction codes are >not substantially the same product (in the sense that the ability >of weather prediction codes to predict the weather says anything >about the ability of climate prediction codes to predict the climate). >Weather prediction codes can ignore any effects that do not act fast >enough to substantially affect the weather in a few days. Climate >codes can not. This includes things like sea surface temperatures, >snow cover, sea ice cover which change slowly enough that changes >can be ignored (or modeled very crudely) in weather prediction but >not in climate prediction. It also means weather codes can use >unstable numerical methods as long as they take longer than a few >days to blow up. I imagine Tobis knows all this which makes me >wonder why he keeps bringing up this red herring. > A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, it does >not matter how strong or well tested the other links are. Similarly >it is not sufficient to test part of a complicated computer model. Bob Grumbine chose to quote part of this: > Weather prediction codes and climate prediction codes are >not substantially the same product so as to attack a strawman as follows: > You keep saying this. You also continue to not state your >source of knowledge. Tobis and I work with these models, he >more on climate, me more on weather, and from experience with >them, we consider them to be quite substantially the same product. >What is your experience with NWP and GCM codes that you assert >so confidently that we're wrong? I am not talking about how many lines of code weather models and climate models may have in common, the question you and Tobis seem to prefer to debate. A model may give reasonable results for one range of parameters and complete nonsense for a different range of parameters. In this case you have two models which share 100% of the code one of which is ok and the other of which is not. So even if climate models and weather models share a lot of code this does not mean that experimental validation of the weather model says much of anything about the validity of the climate model. At best you just have a little more confidence that the model is coded correctly. As for my source of knowledge, I do not need any detailed knowledge of weather and climate models to know that a good weather model could prove to be a poor climate model for the reasons I stated. This is obvious. Nor do I need detailed knowledge of celestial mechanics codes to know that the ability of a code to predict planetary motions in the short run (days) does not say much about its ability to predict planetary motions in the long run (millions of years or more) for similar reasons. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming/climate change: a new appoach From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970217.200822.505@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Tue, 18 Feb 1997 01:08:22 GMT References: <5e29bk$np5@access5.digex.net> I stated: > The problem here is that the free parameters in these models >are generally not constants but instead are complicated (and unknown) >functions of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Consider the >earth's albedo for example. There are any number of choices for >albedo as a function of CO2 which will match the current albedo but >differ substantially in a 2*CO2 world. This leads to significant >uncertainty in the temperature change expected in 2*CO2 world. >The only way to eliminate this uncertainty is to somehow derive >these functions. However this is beyond the state of the art. More >complicated models may hide this uncertainty but they do not >eliminate it. For example a model may compute albedo as a function >of cloud distribution, snow cover and sea ice cover but these items >are themselves functions of the CO2 content of the atmosphere. These >items may themselves be expressed as functions of other items but >this is not eliminating the uncertainty it is just moving it around >(and perhaps obscuring it). I prefer simple models where the >limitations are obvious instead of more complicated models which >have obscured with complexity equally bad or worse problems. Bob Grumbine replied in part: > I've left the paragraph untouch, tempting as it was to >try to take it pointwise. In brief, Mr. Shearer is dreadfully >incorrect as to what parameterizations are and how they are >implemented. Most simply, albedo, et al., are _NOT_ functions >are carbon dioxide concentration. This is fundamental both to >his errors and to the fact that one _can_ make parameterizations. I will explain at greater length. Consider a base 1*CO2 climate. This will have certain globally averaged values of albedo, lapse rate, H2O as a function of altitude etc. Now let us vary the CO2 content of the atmosphere. As the CO2 level varies the equilibrium climate will change. (We are assuming here that there is always a meaningful equilibrium climate as we pin the CO2 content of the atmosphere to a different values.) Each new equilibrium climate will have new globally averaged values of albedo etc. So globally averaged equilibrium albedo (etc.) can be thought of as a function of the CO2 level in the atmosphere. Now consider globally averaged surface temperature. This can be roughly predicted by a 1d model if we know certain other parameters (ie globally averaged albedo, lapse rate, cloud cover, H2O as a function of altitude etc.). If we knew these other parameters were not functions of CO2 level (ie would not change as we varied the CO2 content of the atmosphere) then we would be all set. We could use the 1d model to predict the temperature response to added CO2 by varying the CO2 level in the model while fixing the other free parameters at current values. However this is not the case, globally averaged albedo etc. will vary in some unknown (within limits) way as the CO2 level of the atmosphere is increased. One can create more complicated models in which globally averaged albedo etc. are themselves functions of other variables (as temperature is a function of globally averaged albedo etc. in the 1d model) however I do not believe this will significantly reduce the uncertainty in how these variables will respond to added CO2. Bob Grumbine continued: > Albedo of a surface (or volume, in the case of a cloud) is a >function of its physical state. I'll take sea ice for an example. >At the most highly detailed, sea ice albedo is a function of the >snow cover (grain size distribution, depth, age, angle of incidence >of the solar radiation, and portion of incident radiation which is >diffuse versus direct beam, temperature), water ponds if any (size, >depth, shadowing by snow cover or ice, temperature), and the sea ice >(grain size, thickness, brine pockets, temperature). As I said, highly >detailed. But notice: None of these mentions CO2. CO2 just doesn't >affect the albedo of the ice. > > What we do (the above gory function being both unknown and far too >ugly to use) is to find a function which represents the sea ice >albedo well as compared to the observations. The sea ice albedoes >commonly used include one or more: temperature dependence, snow thickness >dependence, ice thickness, and ponding. The modelled albedo can >then be compared to observed albedoes, see Grumbine 1994 and references >therein. The comparison isn't too bad, though not as good as we'd >like, hence (among other things) the SHEBA expedition (http://sheba. >apl.washington.edu/) which will observe sea ice albedo and state >intensely for a year. > > So we have a parameterization which isn't too bad, and are going >to work on finding one that is better. Mr. Shearer believes, from >the above, that the whole enterprise is useless since we're not making >the parameterizations functions of CO2. He is simply and emphatically >wrong. The parameterization means that the albedo is related to >physical quantities. We can use this relation with confidence, even >under changed climates, because the albedo of ice depends on things >like temperature and there is no reason to believe that warm ice will >behave differently 50 years from now than it does this year. > > Almost everything in a weather or climate model has this character >of being independant of CO2 (or other greenhouse gases). Cloud formation >is not a function of CO2; it depends on dynamics, available moisture, >heat release in condensation, avilable condensation nuclei, and a number >of things - other than CO2. Similarly for soil physics, sea ice dynamics, >ocean dynamics, etc. > > In other words, as long as water still freezes at zero and boils at >100 C, the parameterizations are not going to fail magically with a >climate change. As long as the driest deserts in the future aren't dryer >than the driest deserts today, or the wettest rain forest is no wetter >than the wettest today, those parameterizations will continue to be >as reliable as they are now. And so on. > > We'd always like better parameterizations. The standard, contrary >to Mr. Shearer's assertions, for determining whether a parameterization >is better is whether it represents the modelled quantity better. i.e., >a sea ice albedo parameterization is better if it represents observed >sea ice albedo better. It is _also_ usually the case that a better >parameterization makes for a better model (weather or climate). Grumbine asserts here that we can be confident that the parameterizations used in climate models will be just as valid in a 2*CO2 world as they are for today's climate. Put simply, I don't believe him. I believe current models contain numerous empirical portions the reliability of which in a 2*CO2 world is unknown. These are not always obvious. For example a model may contain extra grid points in some area in order to resolve some feature which is known to be important to today's climate. Or the model may contain unreal geography because this gives better results for the current climate. By the way would Lindzen (sp?) agree that the cloud formation parameterizations are independent of CO2? An obvious problem area is that of sea surface temperatures. If these are assumed, this is a CO2 dependent parameterization. If they are not assumed, current models can only get them right with the use of flux corrections which amounts to another CO2 dependent parameterization. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Subject: Re: Global warming, not occuring? From: jbs@watson.ibm.com (James B. Shearer) Organization: ibm Path: jbs Message-ID: <19970318.194905.561@watson.ibm.com> Newsgroups: sci.environment Date: Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:49:05 GMT References: <5gcj78$9ts@news1.mnsinc.com> Rich Puchalsky posted (replying to Michael Tobis): >Our basic disagreement is long-standing; it's about whether the cure for >bad risk assessment is better risk assessment or use of an alternate >decision-making procedure. I find the argument that risk assessment is inherently biased against regulation unconvincing. A more plausible objection in my opinion is that the real purpose of requirements that regulatory agencies perform a cost benefit analysis for proposed new regulations is to make it difficult to enact new regulations that industry groups dislike by providing a basis (inadequate cost benefit analysis) for legal challenges. This of course is a tactic environmentalists use routinely to obstruct projects they dislike by challenging the adequacy of environmental impact reports. In both cases objections are often procedural rather than substantive. Regarding alternate decision making procedures, there is currently some public concern about the fact that children are being decapitated by passenger side airbags in 3 mph parking lot fender benders. What decision-making procedure would Puchalsky recommend to decide what if anything to do about this? More generally how should auto safety regulation be done? Does Puchalsky believe the decision to require airbags was sound? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: NGSA Report 'Flawed': AWEA From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19970910.153813.907@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 19:38:13 GMT References: <9a7651a1&199709100150.SAA26061@igc6.igc.org> John McCarthy writes: >Tom Gray has told us in no uncertain terms that wind power can't pay >for itself competitively. Evidently the estimates of 4.7 cents per >kwh that I have heard from wind advocates - maybe from Tom Gray >himself - are nonsense. Why do you think 4.7 cents per kwh is competitive? What is the figure for gas turbines, a more flexible and less financially risky technology? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Grumbine Usenet review of Health and Amenity Effects of Warming, by Thomas Gale Moore From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971027.232913.558@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 28 Oct 1997 04:29:13 GMT References: <630330$6p4@access2.digex.net> In article <630330$6p4@access2.digex.net>, on 26 Oct 1997 13:44:48 -0500, rmg3@access2.digex.net (Robert Grumbine) writes: > Some points arise now. First, it is clear that we can easily keep >repeating the process, each time taking the variable which explains the most >variance in the remaining portion of the death rate as the variable to use >for orthogonalization. Second, it is clear that the apparent importance >of the variables depends on whether they are correlated to other things >which are good predictors. For instance, due to the correlation between >%>65 and Income, income was aparrently more important than %Black in >predicting death rates. When we remove that relation (%black is essentially >unrelated to %>65), %black is shown to be more important than income. >It is important that we do remove the variables in order of statistical >importance -- except for one family. That is our third point: we do not >want to falsely conclude that the meteorological effects are important >until after all other possibly significant effects are accounted for. If >the reason for a correlation between death rate and high average temperature >is really because, say, old black poor people live in warmer areas >preferentially, we don't want to mislead ourselves in to thinking that >the relation could be affected by temperature. > > So, we will continue the process of orthogonalization, but only with the >non-meteorological variables. In doing this, we find in order of importance, >that the variables affecting death rate are: >%>65, %black, income, number of hospital beds per 100,000 population, %>16 >years education, and number of doctors per 100,000 population. Other variables >do not have any significant effect on predicting the residual variation. > >Having remove all apparently significant variables, let us now consider >the meteorological variables as well. >Variable R R2 t(86) >Tmax -0.36 0.13 -3.57 >T2 -0.21 0.044 -1.95 >Tmin -0.20 0.040 -1.90 >Tbar -0.18 0.032 -1.66 >Heating 0.17 0.029 1.59 >Cooling -0.14 0.020 -1.29 >Sky 0.07 0.005 0.62 >Altitude -0.06 0.004 -0.55 >Latitude 0.06 0.004 0.58 > > At a very long last, we can finally get in to the meat of determining what >significance, if any, meteorological variables have for death rates. I believe your third point above is incorrect and biases your procedure towards finding that the meteorological variables have no significance for death rates. Suppose for example for example two variables A and B are perfectly correlated. If you remove the variance explained by A first then none of the residual variance is explained by B. However it is equally true that if you remove the variance explained by B first then none of the residual variance is explained by A. You cannot conclude in either case that the second variable is unimportant. Similarly for A and B imperfectly correlated, it is incorrect to judge the importance of either variable by the residual variance explained after the dependence on the other is removed. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Grumbine Usenet review of Health and Amenity Effects of Warming, by Thomas Gale Moore From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971103.224432.568@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 4 Nov 1997 03:44:32 GMT References: <630330$6p4@access2.digex.net> <19971027.232913.558@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <63hma0$m3r@access4.digex.net> I continue to argue with Robert Grumbine about his reanalysis of Moore's dataset. I remain unconvinced of its validity. In article <63hma0$m3r@access4.digex.net>, on 2 Nov 1997 05:57:04 -0500, rmg3@access4.digex.net (Robert Grumbine) writes: > Back to our particular case. I wrote: >>>If the reason for a correlation between death rate and high average >>>temperature is really because, say, old black poor people live in >>>warmer areas preferentially, we don't want to mislead ourselves in to >>>thinking that the relation could be affected by temperature. > > You're disagreeing with this !? You have company, in that Moore >makes the same mistake. No, I agree with this. However any adjustment for this must be done correctly or you may mislead yourself into believing temperature is not important when it is. Robert Grumbine continued: > The particular case is that we have a host of variables -- age, >income, race, etc., that we _know_ have an effect on death rates. We >wish to _test_ the _hypothesis_ that weather/climate variables affect >death rates. If you're going to _test_ that hypothesis, you _can't_ >assume it in the first place. In your examples, we have no reason to >give causal priority to A or B. In Moore's situation, we _do_. You also can't assume that weather/climate variables do not affect death rates which is what in effect you are doing by giving priority to all the other variables (not just age, race and income). Robert Grumbine continued: > Your case is even worse when we consider what needs to occur. The >data show that over 90% of the variation in death rate is explained by >non-meteorological effects. For your argument that I should not resolve >the variation explained by race, age, and income first to hold water, >you _must_ be arguing that temperature changes will cause changes in >these things. Not likely. Certainly untrue for race and age. ... I do not need to argue any such thing. I am arguing that if the meteorological variables have some effect on death rates and if the meteorological variables are correlated with other variables your method may wrongly say some the variation in death rates due to the meteorological variables is explained by the non-meteorological variables. Consider the following simple example. Let x,y have mean 0, variance 1 and be .5 correlated. Suppose z=x+y. The variance of z is 3. The best predictor for z in terms of x is 1.5*x and the the residual variance is .75. So if we grant priority to x, Grumbine would say 75% of the variation in z is explained by x, leaving just 25% for y to explain. This is clearly misleading and unfair to y. However Grumbine's 90% claim above is computed in this way. Robert Grumbine also posted: > Note that word. Moore is model-building. This is a statistical >model, but a model nonetheless. I find it interesting that a couple of >people who have most strongly criticized physical climate modelling are >so accepting and even defend a statistical model. Doubly so after the >statistical modelling in question is shown to be exceptionally poorly >done. The points I raised against Moore's work are from _undergraduate_ >courses. The Strang reference is a standard intermediate linear algebra >course -- Junior/Senior level. The DeVore is a standard introductory >statistics text, again Junior/Senior level. I am not defending Moore's methods. I do not recall ever reading his paper and your review neglects to explain exactly what he did. I am criticizing your method (or model if you prefer). James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: CO2 - Cause or Effect? From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971112.180616.806@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Wed, 12 Nov 1997 23:06:16 GMT References: <34601811.82F25AAA@ix.netcom.com> <34602189.99017457@snews.zippo.com> <645k8b$ahj$7@news.hal-pc.org> <64ct5b$ddf@spool.cs.wisc.edu> In article <64ct5b$ddf@spool.cs.wisc.edu>, on 12 Nov 1997 18:39:39 GMT, tobis@scram.ssec.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes: >So? The neat thing about physics is that it is universal. It's >not the radiative transfer theory that has the uncertainties! >So the example of Venus is useful, because it is well understood. > >It's perfectly clear that whatever the response to small increases >of CO2, sufficiently large amounts on an astronomical scale would >cause the earth to get much hotter than merely the result of >pressure effects. What are you claiming here? Are you denying that the main reason Venus is hotter than the earth is the 80 bar Venus atmosphere and not the differing atmospheric compositions? Suppose the Venus atmosphere were 1 bar (with the same composition). What would the average surface temperature be? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Global Warming Sweepstakes From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971209.185200.984@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 9 Dec 1997 23:52:00 GMT Michael Tobis posted: >Rebecca M. Chamberlin (rmchamberlin@lanl.gov) wrote: >: Michael Tobis wrote: >: > >: > When you speak publicly you have as responsibility to avoid inadvertent >: > misrepresentation. > >: Lighten up. He has admitted he made an error. Get on with your life. > >He didn't admit to an error the first time. He tried to weasel out of it. >The second time, he claimed to have *already* admitted to an error, and >tried to minimize the importance of the error by proclaiming that others >make errors. > >On his third response, he managed to invoke Godwin's law, was spectacularly >rude to modest opposing viewpoints, and while claiming to be careful in >his facts, mocked the idea of false information being threatening to democracy, >which is the main point I am trying to make here. > >I can imagine more civilized ways to admit to an error. > >I will let this drop at this point but I will not lighten up. I realize my >usenet personality is a bit stodgy (I'm actually quite a frivolous person >in some circumstances) but I think usenet discussions of the environment >are a matter of some consequence and responsibility. Judge not lest ye be judged. Nobody likes to admit error, particularly in a public forum like this. Consider the about of time it took you to acknowledge your error regarding feedback and the response of systems to forcing. I don't think your record in this regard is so good that you should be throwing stones at others. Also excessive crowing about an opponent's error just leads to your opponents refusing to acknowledge errors in the future discouraging the kind of rational discussion you claim to favor. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Greenhouse Skeptics - Mad or Malicious? From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971209.192210.742@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Wed, 10 Dec 1997 00:22:10 GMT Michael Tobis posted: >Let's make a few points clear - total outgoing radiation is constrained >by solar output, so the integral will not change. The infrared transparency >is known to be changing in well specified ways. What measurement are >you proposing? Total outgoing radiation is only constrained in equilibrium. During the transient response one would expect it to decrease (thus causing the earth to warm up). I will let you calculate the order of magnitude of this decrease. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Greenhouse Skeptics - Mad or Malicious? From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971211.171728.275@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Thu, 11 Dec 1997 22:17:28 GMT References: <19971209.192210.742@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <66nc82$h2j$1@snipp.uninett.no> <66pm14$d09@spool.cs.wisc.edu> Michael Tobis posted (quoting Onar Aam) >: And that's why classical global warming theory predicts stratospheric >: cooling in the transition period: the atmosphere has become more >: opaque to outgoing radiation and hence the stratosphere is not bombarded >: with as much IR radiation as before the transition period. Thus, in that >: transition period the earth is in radiative disequilibrium. > >This is quite wrong. The stratosphere remains cool in the equilibrium >as the gases increase. This is because the atmosphere is less transparent >looking down as well as looking up, so the higher altitudes dono't see as far >down and are less effectively heated. Are you sure about this? I was under the impression that CO2 cools the stratosphere by allowing more effective radiative cooling not by suppressing heating from below. In fact if I am not mistaken heating from below will increase. Michael Tobis (again quoting Onar Aam) >: That shouldn't be too hard should it? For a CO2 doubling the forcing >: is about 4.5 W/m2. Incoming solar radiation is about 240 W/m2, which in >: an equilibrium radiation budget must be matched by an outgoing 240 >: W/m2 radiation. An instantanious doubling would lead to an immediate >: decrease of outgoing radiation to about 235 W/m2, and it would rise >: steadily until it again reaches 240 W/m2. But in the real world the >: numbers would be quite different of course. > >No, that is about right. What of it, given that the thermodynamic time >constant of the atmosphere is about a month or two? But it is the time constant of the whole system that matters. Suppose for example the atmosphere heats to the point that it is radiating 238 W/m**2. This will put the atmosphere out of equilibrium with the ocean so it will also be losing heat to the ocean. If this amounted to the equivalent of 2 W/m**2 there would be a deficit of 2 W/m**2 of outgoing radiation until the ocean surface heated up. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Questions on Global Warming? From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971219.181227.216@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Fri, 19 Dec 1997 23:12:27 GMT References: <679i3p$3d8$5@snipp.uninett.no> <349aa111.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> In article <349aa111.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk>, on 19 Dec 97 16:30:09 GMT, wmc@bsfiles.nerc-bas.ac.uk (William Connolley) writes: >In article 5@snipp.uninett.no, onar@hsr.no (Onar Aam) writes: >>The backwards predictions range from 0.7 to 1.5 C warming. The observed >>warming is 0.3-0.6 C warming. > >Not if you only include coupled GCM's with aerosol's included. They all (though >there are only 2 or 3 of them) show about 0.6 oC rise. Including runs without >aerosol forcing in your "model range" is unrealistic. > >And no, the aerosols aren't tuned to reproduce the warming seen. Are you entirely certain that if the models without aerosols had shown .3-.6 C of warming as opposed to actual warming of .7-1.5 C that aerosol forcing is what would have been added? If not the models are in effect being tuned to match observations. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971219.182231.448@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Fri, 19 Dec 1997 23:22:31 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <67bls6$6pv@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <67c1va$hnu@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <67d0td$pth$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <67d0td$pth$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 19 Dec 1997 05:32:29 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >Clarification accepted. I certainly think that it ended that particular >sub-area of discussion. If Tobis or anyone else can come up with a >reasonable way in which the time scales could work for Sigurdsson's idea >to be more than frivolous, I'll accept Sigurdsson's contention that >he's merely disagreeing with me rather than with known facts. Are you claiming it is known for certain that significant (in terms of cost to society, as compared to that in global warming scenarios) cooling would not have occurred naturally over the next hundred years. I doubt this is a "known fact". Rich Puchalsky also wrote: >But I disagree with Tobis' analysis of his discussion with Sigurdsson in >any case. Any weighting of formal costs and benefits for society must >include finite probabilities of effectively infinite costs. For instance, >a full nuclear exchange that is postulated to wipe out humanity must be >considered to have a finite probability; I don't understand any system in >which it would not have an effectively infinite cost. I would advise >Tobis to look back at what Sigurdsson was advocating; he was suggesting >that very low probability events should not be considered at all. Well then you don't understand cost/benefit analysis. Of course different analysts will come up with different costs but I expect they will all be finite just as they are for individual lives. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Lindzen admitts truth From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971219.190200.617@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Sat, 20 Dec 1997 00:02:00 GMT References: <349805f9.1212689@news.uea.ac.uk> <679qo1$1go$1@news.hal-pc.org> <34996836.1718328@news.uea.ac.uk> <67av5e$8r0$2@snipp.uninett.no> <349977f5.5749219@news.uea.ac.uk> <67bjd8$6pv@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <67cs4s$mdd$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <67cs4s$mdd$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 19 Dec 1997 04:11:08 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >Michael Tobis (tobis@scram.ssec.wisc.edu) wrote: >: The silly tendency that people have to treat the entire set of people >: who disagree with them as a unit is prominent on sci.environment. >... >: of Mr. Nudds, whose sometimes valid points are swamped in this irresponsible >: and divisive form of nonsense. I think "denialist" is his word, and I am >: dismayed to see it gaining currency. > >It is indeed wrong to lump everyone who disagrees with you together. However, >when people are arguing from ideology rather than logic, it is usually an >ideology that is common to a group of people. I think it is accurate in >these cases to give the ideology a name. And if particular people show >by their arguments that they are arguing from the ideology, I see no >reason not to refer to them as adherents to it. To extent that skepticism about global warming has a common thread, I would say it is self-interest. People believe what it is convenient for them to believe. If you are reluctant to make sacrifices to prevent global warming, it is convenient for you to believe that global warming is not a serious problem and you will tend to do so. Rich Puchalsky continued: >If you consider "denialism" to be an ideology, then I think that it makes >sense to refer to individuals as denialists. Of course, not all who >disagree with consensus science disagree for ideological reasons, and they >should not be lumped into the category without cause. Inventing a "denialist" ideology consisting of the belief that adding CO2 to the atmosphere may not cause significant warming and then claiming global warming skeptics are arguing from a common ideology because they are all "denialists" seems like circular reasoning to me. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971222.180833.400@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Mon, 22 Dec 1997 23:08:33 GMT References: <34992AA4.72DF@vision.net.au> <349a4caf.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <349B2CAA.4E3@vision.net.au> <67h08o$a5c$2@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <67h08o$a5c$2@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 20 Dec 1997 17:46:00 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >John Daly (daly@vision.net.au) wrote: >: Schneider & Rasool, Rasool & Schneider, what's the difference? They are >: both equally responsible for the contents of the paper. > >Wrong! The order of authorship is very important to researchers, who >regularly distinguish between first authorship and otherwise. In addition, >a cite is simply not correct if it gets the order of authors reversed. This is not quite right. In many cases, particularly with a small number of authors, the authors are simply listed in alphabetical order and the order is not otherwise significant. It is true however that when the order is not alphabetical it is significant. Incidentally I think Puchalshy's suspicion that the order was deliberately reversed at some point is reasonable. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971222.182804.624@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Mon, 22 Dec 1997 23:28:04 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971219.182231.448@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <67mece$t11$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <67mece$t11$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 22 Dec 1997 19:17:34 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: In article <67d0td$pth$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, >: on 19 Dec 1997 05:32:29 GMT, >: richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >: >Clarification accepted. I certainly think that it ended that particular >: >sub-area of discussion. If Tobis or anyone else can come up with a >: >reasonable way in which the time scales could work for Sigurdsson's idea >: >to be more than frivolous, I'll accept Sigurdsson's contention that >: >he's merely disagreeing with me rather than with known facts. > >: Are you claiming it is known for certain that significant (in >: terms of cost to society, as compared to that in global warming >: scenarios) cooling would not have occurred naturally over the next >: hundred years. I doubt this is a "known fact". > >Does Shearer define any global cooling as an "ice age"? Puchalsky is quibbling. I excluded trivial cooling. If significant cooling is possible it should be included in any analysis of options. If Tobis's point about timescales is just that ice sheets take more than 100 years to form, it is a pretty feeble one. You don't need a 1000 meter ice sheet to cause significant damage. Btw does Puchalsky object to the term "little ice age". Puchalsky continued (still quoting me). >: Well then you don't understand cost/benefit analysis. Of >: course different analysts will come up with different costs but I >: expect they will all be finite just as they are for individual lives. > >If any analyst comes up with a finite dollar cost for the complete >destruction of the human species than that analyst is incompetent. I >suggest that Sheaer simply does not understand cost/benefit analysis >and the difficulties of its application to certain low probability but >large scale potential outcomes. I don't see the problem. Since Puchalsky abhors the entire field of cost/benefit analysis I doubt his ability to judge the competence of its practitioners. Perhaps Puchalsky can explain how placing a finite dollar cost on human extinction leads to logical contradictions or other self evident problems? There can be practical problems when low probability, high cost events dominate expected costs because this will generally mean that the expected costs are highly speculative. But this is not the fault of the method of analysis, it just reflects the fact that the best course of action in such cases is inherently unclear. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971223.120558.345@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 23 Dec 1997 17:05:58 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971219.182231.448@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <67mece$t11$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article , on 22 Dec 1997 13:59:03 -0800, John McCarthy writes: >Rich Puchalsky includes: > > If any analyst comes up with a finite dollar cost for the > complete destruction of the human species than that analyst > is incompetent. > >This may seem right, but it's a mistake. > >First of all, individuals risk their own lives all the time for >finite gain. If an individual put infinite value on his own >life, he would be paralyzed from even crossing the street. To >put it in monetary terms, most people would take a 1/10 chance of >death for $10 million, and this suggests that a person puts $100 >million on his own life, even though that same person would not >agree to be killed immediately for $100 million. I think in this example the suggested value of the person's life is $90 million since he only receives the benefit of the $10 million 90% of the time. This also explains why he would not agree to be killed immediately for $100 million. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971223.175205.928@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 23 Dec 1997 22:52:05 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971222.182804.624@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <67netd$nlq$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <67netd$nlq$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 23 Dec 1997 04:32:45 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: >: Are you claiming it is known for certain that significant (in >: >: terms of cost to society, as compared to that in global warming >: >: scenarios) cooling would not have occurred naturally over the next >: >: hundred years. I doubt this is a "known fact". >: > >: >Does Shearer define any global cooling as an "ice age"? > >: Puchalsky is quibbling. I excluded trivial cooling. If > >It is not a quibble at all. If climate is really naturally changeable over >very short timescales, as certain observations imply and certain theorists >hold, then I can easily imagine a significant cooling for perhaps a decade >or so followed by warming back to the original state (just an example). >If this is an "ice age" then sure, anything is possible. Our anthropogenic >forcing might have prevented several "ice ages" by now, or it may yet >cause a few. The point is that "ice age" means more than just significant >cooling; it generally means what people talk about when they refer to >previous ice ages. They have certain characteristics in terms of duration, >extent, periodicity, severity, etc. besides mere significance. I believe what Tobis was claiming is that the best case for continuing to add CO2 to the atmosphere is no harm. Sigurdsson then objected that the best case was a significant benefit because adding CO2 could be preventing an ice age. If what you and Tobis are saying is, adding CO2 could be preventing a significantly damaging cooling but that Sigurdsson is wrong because this cooling technically should not be called an ice age, this seems to me to be a quibble which does not address the substance of Sigurdsson's post. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971225.182021.969@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Thu, 25 Dec 1997 23:20:21 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <34992AA4.72DF@vision.net.au> <349a4caf.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <349B2CAA.4E3@vision.net.au> <67h08o$a5c$2@news1.mnsinc.com> <19971222.180833.400@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <67pubh$cne$1@news1.mnsinc.com> <67rfm2$onh@nnrp4.farm.idt.net> In article <67rfm2$onh@nnrp4.farm.idt.net>, on 24 Dec 1997 17:10:26 GMT, Joshua Halpern writes: >Rich Puchalsky wrote: >: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: : richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >SNIP... >: : This is not quite right. In many cases, particularly with a >: : small number of authors, the authors are simply listed in alphabetical >: : order and the order is not otherwise significant. > >Where? Well, pure mathematics papers normally list authors alphabetically. For example I looked through 2+ years of the Canadian Journal of Mathematics and all the multiple author papers listed the authors alphabetically. This is an extreme example, still it requires a certain amount of searching to find a pure mathematics paper with the authors not listed alphabetically. However in response to Puchalskys's suggestion that this might vary by field, I poked around a bit in the IBM library yesterday. Some- what to my surprise it appears that pure mathematics is a bit unusual in this respect. This appears to vary quite a bit. Some journals appeared to have little or no tendency to alphabetically list authors. Others did appear to have such a tendency varying from slight to marked. Pure mathematics appears to be an extreme point in this respect. This might be an interesting topic for someone with a lot of time on his hands to study systematically. I suppose customs may have changed over time as well as varying by field. Does this mean mathematicians are unusually selfless? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971226.000034.552@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Fri, 26 Dec 1997 05:00:34 GMT References: <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <67fduj$ciq$1@news1.mnsinc.com> <67k250$svg@nnrp1.farm.idt.net> <67n53p$5eq@nnrp4.farm.idt.net> <67prp9$3nv@nnrp1.farm.idt.net> <67rgie$onh@nnrp4.farm.idt.net> <67rk0n$dnv$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <67rk0n$dnv$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 24 Dec 1997 18:24:23 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >From: John McCarthy >Message-ID: >>Rich Puchalsky includes: >> If any analyst comes up with a finite dollar cost for the >> complete destruction of the human species than that analyst >> is incompetent. >> >>This may seem right, but it's a mistake. > >I replied to the first part of this post already... > >>Second, the same considerations apply to risking the species. I >>read that some tribes believe that a solar eclipse occurs when a >>celestial dog is trying to swallow the sun ... >>It is very, very improbable that >>this tribe is correct in its traditional belief. But can we >>afford to let this belief die out? However, small the >>probability that the tribe is right, the loss will be infinite if >>the dog is allowed to swallow the sun at the next eclipse. > >This is not really a good example, because the fact that we're >arguing over a mathematical model of evaluating risks and benefits >probably means that all of us subscribe to a scientific worldview in >which the risk of the dog swallowing the sun is exactly zero. >There is no point on spending resources on any risks that can >be proved to be wholly imaginary. Certainly Puchalsky can choose to use a value of zero for this risk. However cost/benefit analysis as it is usually done at least purports to use some sort of societal average values. I suppose you could argue this should just apply to the value of various outcomes and that the probability of these outcomes should be computed according to expert opinion. However I am not sure this is a viable distinction. In any case even expert opinion is often divided so some sort of averaging process will be needed. It is of course tempting for an analyst to give his personal opinion more weight than it deserves in computing societal values. I tend to go along with giving little weight to the opinions of people without a scientific worldview. However Puchalsky should be aware that environmentalism often seems to me to be more of a religion than a science so perhaps he should wary of establishing such a precedent. As for more realistic examples, perhaps the first test of an atomic bomb would qualify. There was at least some concern that this might ignite the atmosphere. Of course we know now the risk was zero but it is unclear to me that this was true at the time. Puchalsky made some comments in other posts to which I intended to reply. However they have expired from from my server so I will reply to my memory of his points. Puchalsky felt that assigning a finite value to human existence is meaningless because any such value would be arbitrary. I would agree that the value is arbitrary in the same sense that many parameters in climate models are arbitrary, that is there is a range of reasonable values and the selection of a particular value within the range is at least somewhat arbitrary. This does not mean any value is reasonable or that a decision to exclude some values as unreasonable is arbitrary. In the case at hand I do not believe infinity is within the range of reasonable values for the value of human existence. Puchalsky gave an example where assigning particular values to the value of human existence and the benefits of a risky industrial process would suggest taking what he clearly felt was an unreasonable risk. However this just shows the particular values assigned were wrong. It does not show that any finite value would lead to clearly bad decisions. Does Puchalsky believe any risk to human existence no matter how small should be avoided at any cost (or forgone benefit) no matter how large? Of course Puchalsky could start assigning infinite values to various things beside human existence but then the question arises of where to draw the line. For example would Puchalsky accept the certain loss of 99% of humanity to avoid a 1% risk of human extinction? If Puchalsky does not feel the loss of 100% of humanity is infinitely worse than the loss of 99% where does the infinity arise? Is the loss of 99% of humanity infinitely worse than the loss of 98%? Or does Puchalsky believe any individual human life should be assigned an infinite dollar value? Whatever the merits of such a view in the abstract it is not consistent with how human societies actually behave. It seems reasonable to note here that while we have been discussing values in dollars, technically these values should be expressed in terms of utility. The relation between dollars and utility becomes non-linear for amounts large relative to the total wealth of an individual or society as a whole. For example I doubt the second billion was as big a thrill to Bill Gates as the first. Also as noted above cost/benefit analysis usually attempts to use some sort of societal average values. I suspect that doing this risks Arrow type paradoxes particularly in the nonlinear realm. So it may in fact be the case that conventional cost/benefit analysis does not handle problems involving very large costs and benefits well. However I don't see assigning a finite value to human existence as the source of the difficulties. I expressed the view that some societal decisions were inherently difficult. Puchalsky suggested that clever mathematicians should be able to find methods of making such decisions that improve on existing practice. I am a bit surprised at this suggestion. Cost/benefit analysis is the attempt of a bunch of clever people to find a methodology which encourages society to make more rational decisions. Why does Puchalsky think he would find another attempt, which would probably be similar, any more congenial? Puchalsky felt probabilities were in general less uncertain than outcome values. In particular he felt that the probability of an impact exterminating humanity could be ascertained within an order of magnitude. I am unconvinced. This particular case came up in sci.environment some time ago. I felt the no warning risk per year was in the range 0-10**(-10) (note this represents an infinite range in terms of orders of magnitude. I suppose if pressed my lower bound of 0 is not really 0. However I doubt it's very close to 10**(-10) in order of magnitude terms.) Others felt it was higher. There did not seem to be any convincing way of settling the matter. Even the impact energy required seems quite uncertain and that is just part of the problem. Moreover this risk seems much better understand than other potential humanity killers. What are the odds of a humanity killing nuclear exchange? What were the odds during the cold war? How about the odds of a humanity killing epidemic? etc. In general it is quite difficult to accurately estimate the probability of any event which is so rare that we do not know of any actual examples. As for lesser risks, the dangers of many environmental contaminants are very uncertain. In this case the difficulty is identifying the events of interest. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971228.003445.140@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Sun, 28 Dec 1997 05:34:45 GMT References: <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971226.000034.552@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <6820rl$2s6$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <6820rl$2s6$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 27 Dec 1997 04:40:21 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: Puchalsky made some comments in other posts to which I >: intended to reply. However they have expired from from my server >: so I will reply to my memory of his points. >: Puchalsky felt that assigning a finite value to human >: existence is meaningless because any such value would be arbitrary. >: I would agree that the value is arbitrary in the same sense >: that many parameters in climate models are arbitrary, that is there is >: a range of reasonable values and the selection of a particular value >: within the range is at least somewhat arbitrary. This does not mean >: any value is reasonable or that a decision to exclude some values as >: unreasonable is arbitrary. In the case at hand I do not believe >: infinity is within the range of reasonable values for the value of >: human existence. > >This seems frankly nonsensical to me. Unless you posit a deity or some >other supernatural entity, human life only has value to humans. Without >humanity, nothing can have any value, at least not in a human cost- >benefit calculation. There is no amount of money that could reasonably >be accepted in exchange for certain human destruction, because there would >be nothing to spend the money on and no one to spend it. I addressed this point in replying to a post of McCarthy's. Saying humanity is worth $10**16 (for example) does not mean humanity should accept $10**16 of value in exchange for certain destruction since as you point if humanity is destroyed the $10**16 of value will really be worth nothing. Instead it would suggest humanity would be willing to take a 50-50 gamble in which either humanity is destroyed or receives $10**16 of value. Here the risk and benefit balance. Also note $10**16 really means 10**16 times the utility of 1$ which may not be equivalent to any finite number of dollars because of the decreasing marginal utility of money. Puchalsky continued in part. >Certainly any finite value would, since if you're doing a thought experiment >you can always change the finite value to make the problem come out. You >asked for a logical inconsistency and now I think you are quibbling about >finite values. I'll repeat the thought experiment: an industrial process >that triples the human economy at the cost of a 60% chance of wiping out >humanity. If the cost of wiping out humanity has been set to the finite >value of the human economy, the CBA makes it appear that the industrial >process is worthwhile. If you don't like that finite value, you can set >it to whatever finite value you like and change the value of the industrial >process or the chance of destruction accordingly. Do you beleive this >would be a reasonable risk? Change the chance of destruction to 10**(-100) and this seems like a reasonable risk to me. This would imply human existence has a value less than 10**100 * 2 * value of economy which is finite. Infinity is a very large quantity. If you want to know what potential gain would be worth risking a 60% chance of wiping out humanity, opinions will vary just as they would for the analogous question for a single individual. The gain might have to involve things which cannot now be purchased for any amount of money such as eternal youth. This question is bit artificial as in the real world there are generally more than two alternatives. For example there would be ways to make the industrial process safer or to find out whether it would really wipe out humanity before adopting it. Puchalsky continued in part: >No. I make a simpler claim: that current CBA techniques are inadequate >for assisting in how to decide these resource allocation problems. I thought you were claiming that it was nonsensical to assign a finite value to human existence. This is a different claim which I might even agree with depending on what you mean by "inadequate for assisting". Puchalsky continued in part: >Because CBA is a very simple and antiquated mathematical procedure. The >earliest known example, I beleive, was in a letter by Ben Franklin, in >which he sets out the way he made a decision about whether to accept a >job offer. Franklin was certainly clever but I think that advancement >over ideas current in his day is both possible and advantageous. I believe the idea of "utility" is considerably more recent. Puchalsky continued in part: >By the way, CBA proponents rarely sem to face up squarely to the fact that >the real competitor to CBA as a procedure is legislative democracy. There >werre cetain reasons this procedure was adopted for deciding major societal >questions that don't seem to be addressed in many CBA proponent's arguments. I don't see this. Who is suggesting legislative democracy be replaced by CBA? Legislative democracy has an unfortunate tendency to favor factions at the expense of society as a whole which CBA might discourage to some small extent. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971229.172047.804@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Mon, 29 Dec 1997 22:20:47 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <686n9u$5ia$1@news1.mnsinc.com> <6891ih$g7v@spool.cs.wisc.edu> In article <6891ih$g7v@spool.cs.wisc.edu>, on 29 Dec 1997 20:35:29 GMT, tobis@scram.ssec.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes: >One of the best threads around here for a long time, despite the >pointless flaming. As usual I find Shearer particularly interesting. >(I'm afraid this isn't entirely reciprocated but that's life I suppose.) Well, I find Tobis's posts interesting enough to read and respond to. This is partially due to the fact that Tobis appears more willing and able to understand and respond to opposing views than many posters to this group. So Tobis shouldn't feel picked on. Michael Tobis continued: >Also sorry I haven't had a chance to contribute much to it. Let me >interject for now that in addressing the high cost low probablity fringe >events we have a choice of assigning a finite value to the entirety >of human or even vertebrate existence or an infinitesimal value to the >associated probability. I find them both unsatisfactory but prefer the >latter on aesthetic grounds. In practice the results are identical, whether >one's process is formal or informal (and in my opinion, dangerously >susceptible to demagoguery) as Puchalsky would prefer. If infinities and infinitesimals are not needed to compute the correct answers it seems pointlessly confusing to introduce them into the analysis. Actually I doubt Tobis can come up with a reasonable way to obtain the same results using an infinite value for human existence. I will ask him the same question I asked Puchalsky, if you believe the death of all humanity should be assigned an infinite cost but that the death of an average human should be assigned a finite cost, where is the dividing point between finite and infinite? At what point does the death of a single additional human change a finite cost to an infinite cost? Michael Tobis continued: >Where this all began was my insistence that the two tails be given >appropriate weight. My task then is to provide a case that costs at >the high-climate-sensitivity tail of what we find credible are bigger >than those at the low-sensitivity tail. That's fair enough, but what >I'm trying to point out here is that Tom Moore and others who adopt >his arguments, by comparing the low sensitivity tail with the middling >IPCC consensus, (and even presuming, in Moore's case, that somehow the total >perturbation will be limited to a mre equivalent CO2 doubling) is >fundamentally unsound. On this point I have little to add but I think it >bears repetition. The IPCC position is the best estimate, not the worst >case. You may discount the best estimate to the extent that you think >social or political pressures shift it in one direction or the other, but >treating it as a worst case unfairly skews the debate. The tails of interest are not the high-sensitivity tail and the low-sensitivity tail but the high-cost tail and the low-cost tail. These are not the same thing. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971229.181126.876@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Mon, 29 Dec 1997 23:11:26 GMT References: <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971228.003445.140@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <6894ir$nc5$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <6894ir$nc5$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 29 Dec 1997 21:26:51 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: I addressed this point in replying to a post of McCarthy's. >: Saying humanity is worth $10**16 (for example) does not mean >: humanity should accept $10**16 of value in exchange for certain >: destruction since as you point if humanity is destroyed the $10**16 >: of value will really be worth nothing. Instead it would suggest >: humanity would be willing to take a 50-50 gamble in which either >: humanity is destroyed or receives $10**16 of value. Here the risk >: and benefit balance. >: Also note $10**16 really means 10**16 times the utility >: of 1$ which may not be equivalent to any finite number of dollars >: because of the decreasing marginal utility of money. > >I wrote a long answer to this which was lost when my ISP crashed. I'll >try to keep it short this time. It appears that we are in agreement >about one thing: the cost that we're talking about is not a simple >multiple of probability of harm times amount of harm. If it was, than >humanity should indeed accept some finite amount of utility/money in >exchange for immediate certain destruction. So rather than engage in >a basically philosphical discussion over whether humanity has infinite >value, let's clarify what mathematics we're using. Typical CBA uses > >cost = probability of harm x amount of harm > >as I've stated above. You clearly aren't using this simple equation, >so what are you using? It makes no sense to debate whether a quantity >should we finite or infinite unless we know the context in which it >will be used. I am assuming the value of an uncertain outcome is the expectation of the values of the various outcomes (utility is defined so as to allow you to do this). CBA typically assumes linearity. For example that the benefit of saving the lives of A and B is equal to the benefit of saving A's life plus the value of saving B's life. This is often a reasonable approximation. It is generally not reasonable when the values involved are large compared to the total value of human existence. Puchalsky is trying to argue that the value of the outcome humanity receives $10**16 but is immediately destroyed is equal to the benefit ($10**16) minus the cost (value of human existence here also taken to be $10**16) or 0. But this example is clearly in the nonlinear realm so we cannot compute the value of the outcome in this way. Puchalsky continued: >: Change the chance of destruction to 10**(-100) and this seems >: like a reasonable risk to me. This would imply human existence has a >: value less than 10**100 * 2 * value of economy which is finite. Infinity >: is a very large quantity. > >This example was a thought experiment of a process that had a payoff of >3x human economy with a 60% chance of destruction, and was intended to >show that setting humanity's value to the value of the human economy >(or any other finite value) could lead to illogical results. Changing >the chance of destruction to an extremely low number is one may to try to >prove that human value is finite. But would you still agree to the >risk if we changed the payoff to 3 x 10**100 x human economy and the chance >of survival of only 1 in 10**100? I assume not. (This may seem like a silly >thought experiment, but you can imagine a religious eccentric promising >mass revival of everyone into Utopia if they all commit suicide, or some >such scenario, if you like). My point is the same as my one above; the >cost seems to be heavily dependent on the probability of harm in more >than a simple multiplicative fashion. This boils down to the question, what is the value of the everything you could possibly wish for scenario? In particular is it finite or infinite? I would argue it is finite and much less than 10**100 times the current value of human existence. If for example the everything you possibly could wish scenario had a value of 101 times the current value of human existence it would never make sense for humanity to take a gamble with more than a 99% of wiping out humanity since there would be no possible benefit that could compensate for the risk. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971230.110700.088@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 16:07:00 GMT References: <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971228.003445.140@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <6894ir$nc5$1@news1.mnsinc.com> <19971229.181126.876@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> In article <19971229.181126.876@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com>, on Mon, 29 Dec 1997 23:11:26 GMT, jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com writes: > Puchalsky is trying to argue that the value of the outcome >humanity receives $10**16 but is immediately destroyed is equal to >the benefit ($10**16) minus the cost (value of human existence here >also taken to be $10**16) or 0. But this example is clearly in the >nonlinear realm so we cannot compute the value of the outcome in >this way. I will briefly add to my own post here. Another way of looking at this which may be clearer is the following. The value of human existence is not constant but fluctuates with humanity's fortunes. In particular if we take the current value of human existence as $10**16 and then give humanity $10**16 of additional value, the new value of human existence becomes $2*10**16. So the cost of then destroying humanity is not $10**16 but $2*10**16. This leaves humanity in the hole by $10**16, the current value of human existence, (as expected) and confirms this is not a good deal. Clearly similar reasoning shows this is a bad deal regardless of the amount of the payoff. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971230.112307.486@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 16:23:07 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971229.172047.804@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <689ilm$4h5$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <689ilm$4h5$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 30 Dec 1997 01:27:18 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: human existence. I will ask him the same question I asked Puchalsky, >: if you believe the death of all humanity should be assigned an >: infinite cost but that the death of an average human should be >: assigned a finite cost, where is the dividing point between finite >: and infinite? At what point does the death of a single additional >: human change a finite cost to an infinite cost? > >I may have missed this one the first time around. The question is >difficult to answer in practise but easier in principle: people value >their society (in terms of neighborhood, city, nation-state, or culture) >more than the sum of the lives of the individual humans that make up >these associations. The cost of destroying the association starts to >be counted once you've destroyed enough individuals to make the >association unviable. People treat the destruction of the association >as a cost even when no human life is lost. This is just an argument that the value of humanity is not simply the sum of the current values of individual human lives. I agree with this. I do not agree that this will change a finite value to an infinite value. Who believes the value of the associations you mentioned is infinitely greater than the value of people they are made up of? Would Canadians (for example) accept the loss of half the population to avoid being absorbed into the United States? Puchalsky continued in part: >That said, many of the same problems with evaluating life either in monetary >or utility terms can be seen at the level of individual life as well as >in the case of harm affecting all humanity. One sees similar differences >in willingness to accept harm as the probability of harm goes up that does >not correspond to a simple linear relation. Many people might accept a >slight chance of death for a lot of money; few would accept a large chance >of death for even more money (or utility) even when the costs and benefits >officially balance in both cases. Utility is defined so as to make the relationship linear. This means utility is not linear in money. The second million is not worth as much as the first. It may also mean that it is impossible to offer an infinite amount of utility. Again this is the question of what you would risk to have all your wishes come true. Actually, after thinking about it a bit, I think your premise that few people would accept a large chance of death regardless of the size of the reward is wrong. I think many people would accept even certain death for some suitable incentive such as long life and prosperity for all their friends or more negatively the destruction of all their enemies (consider suicide bombers). James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971230.174854.533@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 22:48:54 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971230.112307.486@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <68bh3g$bnb$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <68bh3g$bnb$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 30 Dec 1997 19:12:48 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: >: richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >: >these associations. The cost of destroying the association starts to >: >be counted once you've destroyed enough individuals to make the >: >association unviable. People treat the destruction of the association >: >as a cost even when no human life is lost. > >: This is just an argument that the value of humanity is not >: simply the sum of the current values of individual human lives. I >: agree with this. I do not agree that this will change a finite value >: to an infinite value. Who believes the value of the associations you >: mentioned is infinitely greater than the value of people they are >: made up of? Would Canadians (for example) accept the loss of half >: the population to avoid being absorbed into the United States? > >You clipped the part of my quoted post above where I finish answering >the question. > >To re-quote it: >>The case of destruction of all humanity is a special one because while >>individuals die, nations crumble, and cultures fade, humanity as a whole >>can never die out or everything is lost. I did not realize this was the crucial part of your answer. In other words you think losing 100% of humanity is infinitely worse than losing 99% (assume here losing 99% would not endanger the species). This would mean for example you would prefer the certain death of 99% of humanity to avert a .01% threat of human extinction. This is an implication of assigning a finite cost to losing 99% and an infinite cost to losing 100%. Is this really what you are saying? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971230.180126.988@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 23:01:26 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971229.172047.804@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <68baov$200@spool.cs.wisc.edu> In article <68baov$200@spool.cs.wisc.edu>, on 30 Dec 1997 17:24:47 GMT, tobis@scram.ssec.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes: >jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote: > >: The tails of interest are not the high-sensitivity tail >: and the low-sensitivity tail but the high-cost tail and the low-cost >: tail. These are not the same thing. > >True, since there is considerable uncertainty in the impacts of remediation >efforts as well as in the impacts of the actual forced climate change. >This considerably complicates an already very difficult calculation. > >Nevertheless, it is hard to imagine that the cost of unremediated >climate change is anything other than monotonically increasing with >the extent and rapidity of that change, and faster than linearly as >well. Well, I can easily imagine things being different. Are you seriously arguing the current climate is optimal for humanity and that it is inconceivable that climate could change in a favorable way. Was the end of the last ice age costly to humanity? Was the end of the "little ice age"? Do you have some convincing reason for believing the mild warming of the last 100 years has been harmful? James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971230.181630.573@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 23:16:30 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <686n9u$5ia$1@news1.mnsinc.com> <6891ih$g7v@spool.cs.wisc.edu> <689kf7$5p0$1@news1.mnsinc.com> <68bafi$200@spool.cs.wisc.edu> In article <68bafi$200@spool.cs.wisc.edu>, on 30 Dec 1997 17:19:46 GMT, tobis@scram.ssec.wisc.edu (Michael Tobis) writes: >Rather, on a weighted cost basis, the high cost scenarios require the >most weight. I agree with Shearer that we have to assign a utility function >(thanks for the jargon - that's what I've been trying to say) to the various >scenarios. My claim is that any reasonable way of doing this will give >more weight to climate sensitivities higher than IPCC's than those lower >than IPCC's. This is because the IPCC strives for a physical rather than >a cost mean. You keep assuring us that climate sensitivity is now fairly well known. The cost sensitivity to warming is not. This means the most probable high cost scenarios are those for which moderate warming produces unexpectedly high costs. Similarly the low cost scenarios will be dominated by cases where moderate warming produces unexpectedly low costs or even benefits. Michael Tobis added >Is anyone out there really arguing that the cost increases linearly with >climate change or even more slowly than that? This depends on the type of change. I see no reason to believe all changes would be harmful. James B. Shearer ========================================================================= Path: yktvmv!jbs Subject: Re: Campaign Finance and Global Warming Un From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com Organization: IBM Newsgroups: sci.environment Message-ID: <19971231.181840.382@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> Date: Wed, 31 Dec 1997 23:18:40 GMT References: <349297EF.5ACF@vision.net.au> <34964e15.0@wltss01.nwl.ac.uk> <19971230.180126.988@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> <68e1aj$2ol$1@news1.mnsinc.com> In article <68e1aj$2ol$1@news1.mnsinc.com>, on 31 Dec 1997 18:01:55 GMT, richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >From: jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com >Message-ID: <19971230.174854.533@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com> >>richp@mnsinc.com (Rich Puchalsky) writes: >>>The case of destruction of all humanity is a special one because while >>>individuals die, nations crumble, and cultures fade, humanity as a whole >>>can never die out or everything is lost. >> >> I did not realize this was the crucial part of your answer. >>In other words you think losing 100% of humanity is infinitely worse >>than losing 99% (assume here losing 99% would not endanger the >>species). This would mean for example you would prefer the certain >>death of 99% of humanity to avert a .01% threat of human extinction. >>This is an implication of assigning a finite cost to losing 99% and >>an infinite cost to losing 100%. Is this really what you are saying? > >No, because you are making an unwarranted assumption in your implicit >argument above. Let's examine the pieces: > >A. Losing 100% of humanity is infinitely bad. (my statement) >B. Losing 99% of humanity is very, very bad, but not infinitely so, > assuming that it's not equivalent to losing humanity as a whole > (my statement) >C. With these assumptions we would prefer the certain death of a > large amount of humanity to avert a small chance of total destruction > (your conclusion). > >Your conclusion only follows from the assumptions if you assume that >our estimations of social cost should be calculated as some multiplicative >or additive relation of probability of harm and amount of harm. I can >easily imagine other functions; for a simple example let's >try a function where cost is estimated in bins: > >Cost category 1: expected value of probability times harm is ten person deaths > in the next 50 years > category 2: " 100 person deaths/50 years > 3: " 1000 " > up to > category 10: expected value of probability times harm is infinite > >Society might decide that it is willing to spend so much (finite) money >on preventing each category 1 cost, a larger amount on category 2, etc. The >amount spent on category 10 would still be finite and not equal to all >of society's resources (of course!). > >Please don't take this model as my suggested ideal. I'm only providing >an example of a function that doesn't result in infinite, or even necessarily >large, expenditure in order to avoid a small chance of infinite harm. >I think a more successful and useable function would have greater >discrimination at the high end, but I'm nowhere near good enough at these >things to say what it might be. Normally cost (technically utility) functions are required to have the property that the utility of an uncertain outcome is the expected utility. Under certain plausible assumptions any reasonable utility function can be rescaled to have this property. Consider Puchalsky's cost function. He assigns an infinite cost to the destruction of humanity but a finite cost to a .01% chance of humanity's destruction. This suggests we measure costs in units of probability of complete human destruction. Since Puchalsky assigns a cost of infinity to certain destruction, a finite cost to a .0001 chance of complete destruction and (presumably) a zero cost to a 0 chance of complete destruction, it appears plausible that for any negative event X we can find a probability p such that Puchalsky is indifferent between X for certain and a chance p of complete human destruction (if this is not the case Puchalsky has a strange cost function). Then we say event X has cost p. Now we have a scale in which all costs vary between 0 and 1. Furthermore this cost function has the property that the cost of uncertain outcomes is the expected cost since this is true of the probabilities (this again depends on certain plausible assumptions about the cost function). So suppose we define a new unit the Puchalsky (abbreviated P) defined to represent a 10**(-16) chance of humanity's destruction and measure all costs in P's instead of $. Perhaps a typical human death would represent a cost of about 10**6 P's. Of course by definition human extinction would have a cost of 10**16 P's. Would this make Puchalsky happier? James B. Shearer