Monday, January 22, 2007

Advertisements for themselves....

Sir Oolius returns from a brief hiatus with dispiriting catch from the Houston Chronicle being sucked into the Vranes undertow.

Climate scientists feeling the heat
As public debate deals in absolutes, some experts fear predictions 'have created a monster' by Eric Berger.
UPDATE: Indeed, this had been spotted by Andrew Sipocz in the comments to another post. But since Eli's policy is that reading his own blog is playing with his ears in public, he foolishly did not read Andrew before posting. Silly Rabett.

The article itself is not a bad one (read it), pointing out that most climate scientists don't feel the heat, but of course the last word is had by, Ethon's snack in Boulder

"I can understand how a scientist without tenure can feel the community pressures," says environmental scientist Roger Pielke Jr., a colleague of Vranes' at the University of Colorado.

Pielke says he has felt pressure from his peers: A prominent scientist angrily accused him of being a skeptic, and a scientific journal editor asked him to "dampen" the message of a peer-reviewed paper to derail skeptics and business interests.

"The case for action on climate science, both for energy policy and adaptation, is overwhelming," Pielke says. "But if we oversell the science, our credibility is at stake."

How hard do you think they worked to place this gem. That is, of course, their business. If you are in public policy, you want the policy makers to notice you and think you are top o' the heap. The story, as a piece of whole cloth has been commented on many places, including the Rabett patch, Deltoid, and Andrew Dessler at Gristmill. Read the whole story at Coeruleus and then the article, and you might drop Eric a note on his blog, that he has been taken in by the Boulder Public Relations Group.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

If any of you get a chance, there is an oil business scientist working in our town and commenting on Global warming at the town's newspaper Blog.

http://forums.houmatoday.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/8351034365/m/5741033895?r=5011004895#5011004895

He is a huge skeptic and seems to be in the business of creating more skeptics.

Our town, and the people that live in Terrebonne parish have been recently hurt through deregulations of environmental protections because we are in an area hit by hurricanes. Many people have lost their homes and many more suffer from higher insurance rates. The oil business is running a campaign to deepen a canal so that they can do more business as the the oil industry moves to deeper waters. The canal is dubbed the 'Houma Hurricane highway' it is real name is the Houma Navigational Canal or HNC. 8000 miles of canals dug by the oil and gas exploration business has ruined the Louisiana wetlands and sped up erosion. Please do anything that you can to help get the right information into the public debates and forums. Local business interests run the town and parish.

Anonymous said...

If any of you get a chance, there is an oil business scientist working in our town and commenting on Global warming at the town's newspaper Blog.


http://forums.houmatoday.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/8351034365/m/5741033895?r=5011004895#5011004895

He is a huge skeptic and seems to be in the business of creating more skeptics.

Our town, and the people that live in Terrebonne parish have been recently hurt through deregulations of environmental protections because we are in an area hit by hurricanes. Many people have lost their homes and many more suffer from higher insurance rates. The oil business is running a campaign to deepen a canal so that they can do more business as the the oil industry moves to deeper waters. The canal is dubbed the 'Houma Hurricane highway' it is real name is the Houma Navigational Canal or HNC. 8000 miles of canals dug by the oil and gas exploration business has ruined the Louisiana wetlands and sped up erosion. Please do anything that you can to help get the right information into the public debates and forums. Local business interests run the town and parish.

here is the link to one of the threads

Anonymous said...

Right on Kevin Vranes! You've learned the power of a good troll for journalists from your compatriot Roger Pielke Jr. and nabbed yourself a quote in a regional newspaper.

Good job. Keep up the contrarian blogging about issues that you have not published anything about in the peer-reviewed literature. And you might soon find yourself invited to appear on Fox News.

Anonymous said...

"But if we oversell the science, our credibility is at stake."

What's this "we" and "our" stuff?

Pielke's got a degree in Polic sci for God's sake and he apparently thinks that makes him a real scientist.

He's being more than a little melodramatic if you ask me.

Along with rhetoric and debating, a course in drama must be a requirement for a Poli sci degree.

Anonymous said...

The following is verbatum from "Pielke's Comments on Houston Chronicle story" (taken from his blog Prometheus)

Roger Pielke, Jr:
"First, I was surprised to see the following quote from NAS President Ralph Cicerone, which I had not seen before:

I think we understand the mechanisms of CO2 and climate better than we do of what causes lung cancer. ... In fact, it is fair to say that global warming may be the most carefully and fully studied scientific topic in human history.

Not only is this absurd on its face, it is politically dangerous for those wanting action on climate change. "

Pielke seems to be an expert on all things -- scientific and political. Must be nice.