Bloomberg’s Soda Ban: Do as I Say, Not as I Do

Ah, the hypocrisy of the Left. Former Vice President Al Gore travels the world in a private jet to lecture everyone else on reducing carbon emissions. First Lady Michelle Obama tells people to eat veggies while she and her husband consume burgers, fries, cheesesteaks, and ice cream. And New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, trying to ban super-sized sodas on the theory that doing so will curb obesity, gives away free soda in unlimited quantities to employees of his media conglomerate, Bloomberg L.P.

First Solar's Crony Socialism is a Big Failure | National Legal and Policy Center

- Bishop Hill blog - Another Hockey Stick broken

Paul Matthews points out another serious problem with the Gergis et al paper:

Worse still, proxies were selected with positive or negative correlation. In other words, some were used 'upside-down'.

Die Klimazwiebel: The Other Side of Climate Science

I recently submitted a paper that was somewhat against the mainstream climate change conclusions, and needless to say the paper was rejected.  It was submitted to a sociological journal which I assumed might be less partisan.  But this is not sour grapes about rejection.  I have come to view journals like clubs.  If you don’t agree with the rules of the club then you don’t get membership.  If you can’t find a club to join, start your own and seek like minded souls.  But this is not about trends in academia, it is about one single comment made by a reviewer.

The paper was about comparisons among weather observations for the last decade on the German Baltic coast, the perceptions of regional political stakeholders concerning weather changes over the last decade and what the future will bring, and the perceptions of climate scientists concerning the same things. As it turned out, the observational data demonstrated no change that would be discernable to human experience but the political decision makers made claims to the contrary concerning annual comparisons. Based on these claims the decision makers saw the need for immediate actions to adapt to a future of climate impacts, that is somewhat exaggerated in their account when compared to the advice from science.

Addressing the challenge of climate change must be done discursively through argument, debate and academic evidence | British Politics and Policy at LSE

I think it is not an overstatement to say that climate change and energy policy would not be where it is today without the huge contribution of academic research on climate change.  Indeed, my department, the Department of Energy and Climate Change arguably exists only because of high impact academic research on the science and economics of climate change and how we respond as a society to the challenge.

...My own work is in the Science and Innovation Group in DECC.  My team covers three areas: climate science and observations, which sets out the case for action; greenhouse gas inventory, which measures the emissions of GHGs in the UK; and technical energy analysis, which looks at the efficacy of energy efficiency measures as a first step to reducing overall GHG emissions and ensuring energy security.

...I want to underline the importance of social science and the necessity of having a proper understanding of social transformations and how these happen.  We must strongly resist the temptation to say that because the ‘science says ‘x’, you must do ‘y’.  Where science has an important public policy role, as is the case with climate science, then one should expect the scientific evidence to be challenged – especially given the intrinsic uncertainties in predicting the likely consequences of increasing greenhouse gas concentrations on the earth system and on social systems.  When this happens, then the most appropriate course of action for scientists and policy makers is to be open and transparent.   An important corollary is that scientists also need to be prepared to go out and defend their findings to the public.  Addressing the challenge of climate change has to be done discursively through argument and debate as well being informed by evidence.