by Alex Epstein
The best way to test a model is to see whether it can make accurate and meaningful predictions about the future. In the last thirty years, the climate science community has had the opportunity to do that. Many experts in modeling and in statistics thought this was an extremely dubious enterprise, given how complex the climate is—at least as complex as the economic system, where failed computer models helped promote policies that led to our recent Great Recession.
Consider perhaps the most famous model in the history of climate science, the 1988 model by James Hansen, who has a reputation in the media as the world’s leading climate scientist. At twenty-four years old, the model has been given ample time to show its predictive accuracy. In the graph below, we can see how Hansen’s prediction compares with the actual temperature measurements Hansen subsequently reported; he dramatically overpredicted warming.
Figure 4.2: The NASA/Hansen Climate Model Predictions vs. Reality
Sources: Hansen et al. (1988); RSS; Met Office Hadley Centre HadCRUT4 dataset; RSS Lower troposphere data
Note in particular that since the late 1990s, there has been no increase in average temperatures. Hansen and every other believer in catastrophic global warming expected that there would be, for the simple reason that we have used record, accelerating amounts of CO2. But as the official government data show, these CO2 increases have not driven major temperature increases; as CO2 has increased dramatically, there have been relatively mild periods of warming, cooling, and now flattening. Thus, not just Hansen’s model but every climate model based on CO2 as a major climate driver has been a failure.
Here is a graph of 102 prominent, modern climate models put together by John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville, who collects satellite measurements of temperature. Even though the modern models have the benefit of hindsight and “hindcasting,” reality is so inconsistent with the theory that they can’t come up with a plausible model. And note how radically different all the predictions are; this illustrates that the field of predicting climate is in its infancy.
Figure 4.3: Climate Prediction Models That Can’t Predict Climate
Source: Christy, Climate Model Output from KNMI, Climate Explorer (2014)
Here’s the summary of what has actually happened—a summary that nearly every climate scientist would have to agree with. Since the industrial revolution, we’ve increased CO2 in the atmosphere from .03 percent to .04 percent, and temperatures have gone up less than a degree Celsius, a rate of increase that has occurred at many points in history.25 Few deny that during the last fifteen-plus years, the time of record and accelerating emissions, there has been little to no warming—and the models failed to predict that.26 By contrast, if one assumed that CO2 in the atmosphere had no major positive feedbacks, and just warmed the atmosphere in accordance with the greenhouse effect, this mild warming is pretty much what one would get.
Thus every prediction of drastic future consequences is based on speculative models that have failed to predict the climate trend so far and that speculate a radically different trend than what has actually happened in the last thirty to eighty years of emitting substantial amounts of CO2. And we have not even explored the complete failure to make accurate predictions about climate changes in specific regions, which is what really matters in assessing and adapting to any climate-related threats.
If a climate prediction model can’t predict climate, it is not a valid model—and predictions made on the basis of such a model are not scientific. Those whose models fail but still believe their core hypothesis right still need to acknowledge their failure. If they believe that their hypothesis is right and that complete lack of dramatic warming is just the calm before the storm, they should state all the evidence pro and con.
Unfortunately, many of the scientists, scientific bodies, and especially public intellectuals and media members have not been honest with the public about the failure of their predictions. Like all too many who are attached to a theory that ends up contradicting reality, they have tried to pretend that reality is different from what it is, to the point of extreme and extremely dangerous dishonesty.
CLIMATE DISHONESTY: EXTREME MISREPRESENTATION ABOUT EXTREME WEATHER
As predictions of extreme global warming have completely failed to materialize, there has been more of an emphasis on extreme weather as a reason to oppose fossil fuels. But this is misleading. The prediction of catastrophic climate change is based on the idea that warming will cause extreme weather.
Figure 4.4: Storm Energy Is Normal
Source: Maue (2011, updated June 2014)
And the data bear this out. As might be expected, given that there has been little warming, there has been little change in the trends of various types of storms. For example, here are the most up-to-date data as of mid-2014 on “Accumulated Cyclone Energy,” which is what would need to increase if the frequency and/or intensity of storms were to increase. As the data show, this is, like most things in climate, a dynamic variable—one that shows no dramatic changes recently. There is theoretical debate about how this would change if it had been warming dramatically—but it hasn’t been warming dramatically.
Unfortunately, because people have been led to believe that CO2 somehow causes climate change in addition to, not as a consequence of, global warming, it seems plausible to blame individual hurricanes on CO2, even though the temperatures haven’t increased. It is disingenuous for climate activists to blame every storm on climate change when there has been so little warming so far and when storm trends are so unremarkable. Remember, climate is always volatile, climate is always dangerous.
Or take the issue of sea levels, which we hear are rapidly rising. Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth terrified many with claims of likely twenty-foot rises in sea levels.27 Given the temperature trends, however, we wouldn’t expect warming to have a dramatic effect on sea levels. And, in fact, it hasn’t.
Figure 4.5 shows sea level trends from locations throughout the world. Note how smooth the trends are—and also notice how several of them are downward. This points to a truth about sea level and climate. It is affected by many factors, often factors that are much more important than any change in the global climate system.
But what about all those extreme scenarios of future sea level rise? They are not based on real trends or proven science; they are based on climate-prediction models that can’t predict climate. And anyone who tries to equate science and speculation is being unethical. Which is, unfortunately, rampant.
CLIMATE DISHONESTY: EQUATING THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT WITH CATASTROPHIC CLIMATE CHANGE
The entire modern enterprise of catastrophic climate change predictions, the enterprise that threatens our energy supply, is based on equating a demonstrated scientific truth, the greenhouse effect, with extremely speculative projections made by invalidated models.
Figure 4.5: What Sea Level Rise Actually Looks Like
Source: Tide Gauge Data, Permanent Service for Mean Sea Level (2014)
In 1989, Bill McKibben pioneered this tactic in The End of Nature, wherein he called catastrophic climate change “the greenhouse effect.” That would have been news to one of the discoverers of the greenhouse effect, Svante Arrhenius, who regarded increased CO2 emissions as a very positive phenomenon. In 1896 he said: “By the influence of the increasing percentage of carbonic acid in the atmosphere, we may hope to enjoy ages with more equable and better climates, especially as regards the colder regions of the earth, ages when the earth will bring forth much more abundant crops than at present, for the benefit of rapidly propagating mankind.”28 (Remember this when we get to the fertilizer effect section below.)
Yet McKibben and others equate the greenhouse effect, dramatic global warming, and catastrophic global warming as it suits their political goals. By this kind of trickery, those who dispute catastrophic global warming are accused of denying the greenhouse effect and glob
al warming. I experienced this in 2013 when I woke up to find myself named to Rolling Stone’s Top 10 list of “Global Warming’s Denier Elite”29—in which they cited three articles of mine, each of which explained that CO2 has a warming effect!
Here’s what we know. There is a greenhouse effect. It’s logarithmic. The temperature has increased very mildly and leveled off completely in recent years. The climate-prediction models are failures, especially models based on CO2 as the major climate driver, reflecting a failed attempt to sufficiently comprehend and predict an enormously complex system.
But many professional organizations, scientists, and journalists have deliberately tried to manipulate us into equating the greenhouse effect with the predictions of invalid computer models based on their demonstrably faulty understanding of how CO2 actually affects climate.
THE 97 PERCENT FABRICATION
This brings us to the oft-cited comment that 97 percent of climate scientists agree that there is global warming and that human beings are the main cause.30
First of all, this statement itself, even if it were true, is deliberately manipulative. The reason we care about recent global warming or climate change is not simply that human beings are allegedly the main cause. It’s the allegation that man-made warming will be extremely harmful to human life. The 97 percent claim says nothing whatsoever about magnitude or catastrophe. If we’re the main cause of the mild warming of the last century or so, that does not begin to resemble anything that would justify taking away our machine food.
But note how when I quoted John Kerry earlier, he went from “97 percent of climate scientists have confirmed that climate change is happening and that human activity is responsible” to “they agree that, if we continue to go down the same path that we are going down today, the world as we know it will change—and it will change dramatically for the worse.”31 Even in the 97 percent studies, which we’ll look at in a moment, there is nothing resembling “97 percent of climate scientists have confirmed that . . . the world as we know it will change . . . dramatically for the worse.” Kerry is pulling a bait and switch—using alleged agreement about a noncatastrophic prediction about climate to gain false authority for his catastrophic prediction about climate—and the anti–fossil fuel policies he wants to pass at home and abroad.
Unfortunately, this is very common. On his Twitter account, President Obama tweeted. “Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree: #climate change is real, man-made and dangerous.”32 There was no “dangerous” in the alleged agreement—and it wasn’t “scientists,” it was “climate scientists.” This sloppy use of “science” as an authority, practiced by politicians of all parties, guarantees that we make bad, unscientific decisions.
On top of that, it turns out that the relatively mild “agreement” of the 97 percent is also a complete fabrication—which almost no one knows, because we’re taught to obey authorities rather than have them advise us with clear explanations.
One of the main papers behind the 97 percent claim is authored by John Cook, who runs the popular Web site SkepticalScience.com, a virtual encyclopedia of arguments trying to defend predictions of catastrophic climate change from all challenges.
Here is Cook’s summary of his paper: “Cook et al. (2013) found that over 97 percent [of papers he surveyed] endorsed the view that the Earth is warming up and human emissions of greenhouse gases are the main cause.”33
This is a fairly clear statement—97 percent of the papers surveyed endorsed the view that man-made greenhouse gases were the main cause—main in common usage meaning more than 50 percent.
But even a quick scan of the paper reveals that this is not the case.
Cook is able to demonstrate only that a relative handful endorse “the view that the Earth is warming up and human emissions of greenhouse gases are the main cause.” Cook calls this “explicit endorsement with quantification” (quantification meaning 50 percent or more). The problem is, only a small percentage of the papers fall into this category; Cook does not say what percentage, but when the study was publicly challenged by economist David Friedman, one observer calculated that only 1.6 percent explicitly stated that man-made greenhouse gases caused at least 50 percent of global warming.34
Where did most of the 97 percent come from, then? Cook had created a category called “explicit endorsement without quantification”—that is, papers in which the author, by Cook’s admission, did not say whether 1 percent or 50 percent or 100 percent of the warming was caused by man.35 He had also created a category called “implicit endorsement,” for papers that imply (but don’t say) that there is some man-made global warming and don’t quantify it.36 In other words, he created two categories that he labeled as endorsing a view that they most certainly didn’t.
The 97 percent claim is a deliberate misrepresentation designed to intimidate the public—and numerous scientists whose papers were classified by Cook protested:
“Cook survey included 10 of my 122 eligible papers. 5/10 were rated incorrectly. 4/5 were rated as endorse rather than neutral.”
—Dr. Richard Tol37
“That is not an accurate representation of my paper . . .”
—Dr. Craig Idso38
“Nope . . . it is not an accurate representation.”
—Dr. Nir Shaviv39
“Cook et al. (2013) is based on a strawman argument . . .”
—Dr. Nicola Scafetta40
Think about how many times you hear that 97 percent or some similar figure thrown around. It’s based on crude manipulation propagated by people whose ideological agenda it serves. It is a license to intimidate.
CLIMATE ETHICS
The state of climate communication is a disgrace. Speaking from personal experience, it is incredibly difficult to get a straight answer about what is and isn’t known in the field, because so much of it is catastrophic speculation by people who seem more focused on a political goal than on clear, honest, big-picture communication.
In 1996, Stanford climate scientist Stephen Schneider wrote an influential paper about the ethics of exaggerating the evidence for catastrophic climate change.
On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but—which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands, and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we’d like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climate change. To do that we need to get some broad based support, to capture the public’s imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This “double ethical bind” we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both.41
I disagree entirely that this is a double ethical bind. It is doubly unethical. It requires deliberately misleading the public, which inevitably leads to uninformed, dangerous decision making.
We live in a society that has risen via the division of labor, by each of us specializing in, even mastering, some relatively small sliver of the ingredients of human survival and flourishing, so that in the aggregate we might create a world with an amazing sum of knowledge, technological achievement, and progress.
Specialization implies a sacred obligation. The specialist must never misrepresent what he knows and doesn’t know, what he can do or can’t do. The incompetent mechanic who claims that he can fix your complex engine problem, capitalizing on the fact that you know even less about engines than he does, is immoral.
In intellectual endeavors, in every field, there is an immense range of knowledge and opinion, from the d
ecisively demonstrated to the wildly speculative. This is a good thing: Human knowledge builds on established knowledge, and each next step takes time to reach and establish. But specialists within the field have an obligation to explain precisely what they know and don’t know—and also to welcome critical questioning and debate.
It can literally be deadly for a scientist to spread a hypothesis as fact. Take the realm of nutrition. For years, the government spread the gospel, treated as nutritionally proved, that a low-fat diet was healthy—a campaign that coincided with record obesity. I’m not going to claim that I know the perfect diet. The point is that, at this stage, no one appears to—and when scientists with speculative theories feel licensed to disseminate them as fact, it is the most irresponsible scientists who will often garner the most praise.
One such scientist is Paul Ehrlich, who writes: “Scientists need to be direct and succinct when dealing with the electronic media. One could talk for hours about the uncertainties associated with global warming. But a statement like ‘Pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere could lead to large-scale food shortages’ is entirely accurate scientifically and will catch the public’s attention.”42 Is such a statement “entirely accurate scientifically”? What about the fact that were it not for the industry that necessarily emits greenhouse gases and were it not for the fact that Ehrlich’s proposals to dismantle it were not followed, millions or billions would have died of starvation?