With respect to RealClimate, in particular, you clearly differentiative between them and the scientific journals. On what grounds? What are the journals supposedly doing (or not doing) that makes them different from RealClimate? You can’t appeal to peer review here, because peer review is imperfect, and the reviews are done by scientists, most of whom probably disagree with your viewpoint on RealClimate! So if RealClimate is “biased” then so are the journals! That puts us in the wonderful position of having no purely scientific basis for the study of climate. Is that really the intellectual position you wish to take?
Eric Steig

Finally, your saying “there is plenty of discussion of climate science with no extra-scientific context. Just look at the Journal of Climate…” is misleading – you are using that to imply that RC isn’t in that state, without ever presenting any arguments for why.

And even more finally… you have never really answered Gavins point “Yet you lump us in with the obviously policy-driven pseudo-scientists.”

I hope that they’ve learned to fly straight since they were on my daily read list. I somewhat doubt it.

Thanks much for your thoughtful comments. Let me respond to several of your points. First, you write, “You appear to be under the impression that no discussion of climate science can take place without having an explicit or implicit policy agenda.” Of course I believe that there is plenty of discussion of climate science with no extra-scientific context. Just look at the Journal of Climate or JGR-Atmospheres or Climatic Change and so on. But at the same time, most everyone who has anything to do with climate research knows full well that a very public and very political debate is taking place in terms of science. So scientists, agency officials, political advocates, weblog hosts and reporters each make decisions about what science to pursue, what findings to report, what findings are significant, etc. while being completely aware of this political context. You also write, “There must be a role for scientists to point out that pseudo-scientific arguments made in support of different policy options are fallacious.” Yes there are such roles, and as I written these roles come in two guises, the political advocate who seeks to reduce the scope of choices available to decision makers and the honest broker who seeks to expand (or at least clarify) the scope of choice. In my view, both political advocates and honest brokers of policy options are noble causes. I just happen to believe that the science community is flush with the former and has a dearth of the latter. Like many scholars who study the role of science in society, I believe that the empirical and theoretical scholarship in this area shows definitively that you cannot seek to clarify the science in political debates without becoming part of that debate itself (see my recent book review of Bocking’s new book). If RealClimate wants to serve as an honest broker for decision makers and the public on the climate issue, then it should openly discuss policy options. In the peer-reviewed journals we already have honest brokers on science. Once you take the step of explaining the significance of science to the public or decision makers, whether you like it or not, you have moved from the systematic pursuit of knowledge (science) to the world of decisions and their impacts. Scientists should take on such roles, but they should not pretend that it is science. Thanks again and I look forward to continued discussions!

You appear to be under the impression that no discussion of climate science can take place without having an explicit or implicit policy agenda. I simply can’t agree with this. I am a scientist, not because I am pushing a political program, but because I am interested in the process of science for finding things out about the world. That my particular specialty (climate) has become more interesting to the layperson because of the issue of climate change has both positive and negative aspects. For instance it makes it easier to talk to people at parties, but now I also get hate mail.

With respect to RealClimate (where I play a significant role), we have tried to give a sense of what scientists are really thinking and how they come to their conclusions on climate and climate change. That we tend to support IPCC conclusions is therefore no surprise – however, we have not advocated any policy options at all. In fact, we have studiously tried to avoid all such discussions. Yet you lump us in with the obviously policy-driven pseudo-scientists.

There must be a role for scientists to point out that pseudo-scientific arguments made in support of different policy options are fallacious. If we do not do it, who will? In commenting on an argument we do not endorse the policy position it was purporting to support (nor the opposing position). A good policy could be supported by a fallacious argument, just as a bad policy could be supported by ‘good’ science. Obviously judging whether a policy is good or bad is a value judgement, however, judging whether a scientific argument holds water is much more objective.

We have criticised arguments and exaggerations on all sides and will continue to do so.

You have often decried the lack of honest brokers in the climate debate. Our reward for attempting to play such a role is that you class us as underhand yet unsucessful policy advocates. You are, in this case, mistaken.

Gavin Schmidt

Confused at the variety of politicians, activists, and op-ed authors working climate change into their agendas? It might be helpful to classify them for further…

While that is the non-profit side of WLEDs, (white light emitting diodes), their 5-10:1 energy advantage over incandescent and flourescent output, and negligible waste implact, makes them a “disruptive technology” of the best sort.