Legislating Science in North Carolina
The history of governments meddling in the practice of science is not a good one. The most infamous case is that of Lysenkoism -Stalin backed the ideas of Trofim Denisovich Lysenko who believed in the inheritance of acquired characteristics. His ideas became of the official sanctioned science of the Soviet government. Genetics was declared a “bourgeois science,” or “fascist science,” and many geneticists who disagreed with Lysenko were executed or sent to labor camps. Execution tends to have a chilling effect on the free exchange of ideas and the practice of science. Over seven decades later genetic science in Russia is still lagging behind.
In the US we have a similar problem – not the Gulag, but political factions that disagree with certain findings of science that are ideologically inconvenient for them. The two biggest issues being targeted (but certainly not the only ones) are evolution and climate change. Much of the focus has been on what should be taught to students in science class (my vote is for science).
Recently the North Carolina legislature proposed House Bill 819 to study the effect of climate change on sea levels, and therefore coastlines. For some reason the legislators felt the need to include in the bill specific restrictions on how the science can be done. Section 2 includes this line:
These rates shall only be determined using historical data, and these data shall be limited to the time period following the year 1900. Rates of sea-level rise may be extrapolated linearly to estimate future rates of rise but shall not include scenarios of accelerated rates of sea-level rise.
Apparently being elected to the State House of North Carolina invests politicians with superior knowledge (to actual scientists who work in the field) as to the proper way to model future trends. Extrapolating current trends into the future is always tricky. The very heart of any such extrapolation is to know what the mathematical trend is. There is a tendency to assume a linear extrapolation, but that is usually not the case.
The problem with linear extrapolation of trends is that often we are looking at a small part of the slope of a complex and changing phenomenon, and there is no justification for assuming that current short term trends will hold up in the long term. Usually this takes the form of, “If current trends continue (linearly is often assumed), then in X amount of time something horrible will happen.” However, we may just be looking at a the ups and downs of a cycle, which is only apparent when longer term data is looked at.
Further, there are often game changers that alter the factors involved in creating the trend. Systems reach saturation points, compensatory mechanisms take hold, technology advances, and times change.
On the other hand, some systems have feedback loops that can actually increase the rate of change over time, so the trend is not linear but geometric or exponential. If in 1960 you tried to predict what computer technology would look like in 2012 by extrapolating linearly from advances so far, your estimates would be off by many orders of magnitude. Advances in computer technology have been geometric, doubling roughly every two years, or 18 months if you believe Intel (a phenomenon known as Moore’s law, which specifically referred to the density of transistors on computer chips).
What is the proper way to mathematically model future changes in sea level based upon recent climate data? That is a highly technical scientific question best left to those with expertise in this area. Climate has many feedback loops and game-changing consequences that need to be taken into account. How this all works out is a legitimate matter of scientific debate, and there are many viable models. Here is a good discussion of the issue, specifically relating to the recent IPCC report on sea level change. They discuss a number of different scenarios, producing predictions of sea level rise by the end of the century between 18 and 59 cm. The extrapolations are all fairly conservative, in that they in fact rely on some linear extrapolations of some things like the flow of ice from Greenland. They acknowledge that this can dramatically change, and may even slow, or the glaciers may rapidly slide off into the North Atlantic, changing all predictions of sea level rise.
The North Carolina bill does more than dictate how publicly funded scientists may extrapolate future trends, they also dictate that they may only use historical data. In other words, they cannot use climate models – they can’t use any actual scientific understanding of climate and the forces at work that can affect climate. They must take a simplistic approach of extending the line from historical data into the future, and they must do it in a linear fashion.
This bill is an amazing combination of ignorance and hubris. It is perhaps an excellent example of the Dunning Kruger effect whereby ignorance renders one unable to detect their own ignorance. Only a scientifically illiterate legislator would be unable to determine how scientifically illiterate this bill is.
I hope the researchers expected to work on this study will say it’s not science and refuse to participate.
This bill is just incredibly silly, and extremely scary at the same time. I wonder though if scientists will still be allowed to extrapolate log(sea level) linearly….
I wonder what the NC insurance industry thinks about this bill.They have a great deal at stake in getting the correct data.
This article by Stefan Rahmstorf (Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research) discusses the problems with physical models of sea level rise and why they actually underestimate SLR as compared to empirical observations :
http://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/modeling-sea-level-rise-25857988
He makes a case for using semi-empirical models instead:
You know, it would be fun to require all the legislators who vote “yes” on this to own beachfront homes…
Ironicly, the legislators pushing for this legislation are from the coastal counties, thus most affected by sea level rise. But I guess significantly rising sea levels in the future are bad for the local economy today, so obviously it makes perfect sense to limit the predicted rise via legislation, keep property values and planned developments intact and let the next generation deal with the outcomes, when the sea level turns out not to care about legislation.
I’d wager large numbers of them already do. Self-interest isn’t the problem, and is no match for ideogically-driven rejection of reality.
And orbits may be modeled as epicycles on epicycles, but shall not include ellipses. And pi shall be defined as 3.
It’ll be a quick study. Take a graph of historical data, and fit a line through it. The legislators obviously know what result they expect, so why not skip a step and just legislate the result: The study shall find a sea level rise no greater than 18 cm by the end of the century.
At least they’re making their intentions clear from the outset.
Rick Perry’s administration censored a report on the Gulf Coast environment because it was “inconsistent with current Agency policy,” without explaining what that policy was. They replaced the words “sea level rise” with “sea level change” in the report.
When Elvis Presley died in 1977 there were 37 Elvis impersonators in the world. In 1994 there were 48,000. If the current trend continues, by the year 2010, one out of every three people in the world will be an Elvis impersonator.
North Carolina legislating science on sea level rise = BAD.
Federal government legislating science on sea level rise = GOOD.
Apparently it’s only bad if you disagree with it.
In what way is the Federal government legislating science on sea level rise? Funding science is not the same as determining ahead of time what will be accepted as science.
I guess you must mean one of those “legislative” initiatives:
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/effects/coastal/CESLAC.pdf
1.2 Objectives and Scope of Committee Activities
The purpose of the Committee is to “provide advice … on the conduct of a study titled Coastal
Elevations and Sea Level Rise to be conducted as part of the U.S. Climate Change Science
Program. Within the context of the basic study plan, CESLAC will advise on the specific issues
to be addressed, appropriate technical approaches, the nature of information relevant to decision
makers, the content of the final report, and other matters important to the successful achievement
of the objectives of the study.”
or the final 320 page report. I guess for a denialist a policy statement?
http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap4-1/final-report/sap4-1-final-report-all.pdf
http://risingsea.net/ERL/shore-protection-and-retreat-sea-level-rise-South-Florida.pdf
Before you post bullshit – provide some links, evidence for your claims or please stop talking out of your arse – it just smells bad.
Talk about projection…
and your point is?
I think he was replying to Trimegistus.
Stephen Colbert: “I think we should start applying this method to even more things we don’t want to happen. For example, I don’t want to die, but the actuaries at my insurance company are convinced that it will happen sometime in the next 50 years. However, if we only consider historical data, I’ve been alive my entire life, therefore I always will be.” –“The Word: Sink or Swim,” The Colbert Report, 4 June 2012; video at http://www.colbertnation.com/.
Good luck with the underwriters for any coastal development. THOSE guys don’t survive by sticking their heads in the sand.
more here;
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/06/11/science-vs-agw-advocacy-in-north-carolina/
95 per cent “junk dna”!? thats science and its explanation of what it does not understand.