In today’s New York Times, Nicolas Kristof has a column on gene therapies and its effects on people and humankind.

He closes his essay with this comment:

“Perhaps the most important and complex decision in the history of our species is approaching: in what ways should we improve our genetic endowment? Yet we are neither focused on this question nor adequately schooled to resolve it.

So we desperately need greater scientific literacy, and it’s past time for a post-Sputnik style revitalization of science education, especially genetics, to help us figure out if we want our descendants to belong to the same species as we do.”

If we have $1.00 to spend on “the most important and complex decision in the history of our species” I wonder what fraction it would make sense to devote to spend on a massive campaign of public education, versus other possible investments.

Kristof provides no data, but I’d guess his call for public education is grounded in his underlying assumptions of democracy (see my post earlier today) rather than any empirical evidence that such campaigns actually led to better societal outcomes. But I’d welcome any evidence to the contrary.

The New Yorker online has an excellent article by Louis Menand on voting and democracy, or at least how these issues look through the lens of political scientists.

Menand writes:

“Skepticism about the competence of the masses to govern themselves is as old as mass self-government…”

Political scientists, at least, have given up on the notion that the public can come to well-informed judgments about political candidates, much less complicated issues of policy. The perspective of political scientists raises difficult questions about the viability of “public education” as a strategy for coming to grips with complicated issues like global climate change, genetic technologies, and international terrorism.

But if people aren’t the source of wisdom in a democracy, then where does it come from? Menad offers two alternatives in the form of three theories:

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Project Specialist

The East-West Center is accepting applications for a two-year limited full-time position as Project Specialist in the Research Program for a project entitled “Managing Climate Risks in the Pacific: Pacific Islands Regional Integrated Science and Assessment (Pacific RISA) Program”. Major responsibilities include: collection, interpretation and analysis of data; technical support for meetings, workshops, project website, report preparation and other mechanisms associated with public outreach components of the project; and assist in project-related activities designed to improve understanding of the consequences of climate variability and change for Pacific Island communities, businesses and natural resources and to support climate risk management activities designed to enhance resilience in the face of climate-related extreme events such as droughts, floods and tropical cyclones.

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In today’s Washington Post there is a very interesting op-ed on stem cell science and policy by Ruth R. Faden and John D. Gearhart, both professors at Johns Hopkins.

They write:

“The controversy about stem cells, and the choice between Kerry and Bush on stem cell policy, is not about science; it really is about values — moral values. The science is clear. The only way to ensure that we realize the promise of stem cell research as quickly as possible is to permit federal funding to be used to create new embryonic stem cell lines and to support research with new lines. President Bush’s values are also clear. He believes that the destruction of embryos can never be morally justified, no matter how much human suffering might be alleviated, even if the embryos are only still a clump of cells not visible to the human eye and even if the embryos will be destroyed in any event in fertility clinics where they are no longer needed. We believe that most Americans have different moral values from the president’s.”

The latter assertion would seem highly questionable, at least according to recent polls. According to a July 2004 survey by the Gallup organization, when asked if John Kerry or George Bush “Shares your values” the public split 47% to 46% respectively. But it is also clear that public opinion on stem cells depends upon how the issue is framed. According to Matthew Nisbet of Ohio State:

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Career Opportunity: Program Officer

Board on Atmospheric Sciences & Climate
The National Academies

The Board on Atmospheric Sciences & Climate is seeking an exceptional person with strong scientific expertise and an interest in applying science in the policy arena. A Program Officer (sometimes called Study Director) is responsible for all aspects of implementation of the Board’s work – designing studies, working with agencies and committees of experts, analyzing complex issues, and preparing reports. It’s a dynamic work environment – the National Academies’ staff of more than 1000 people address all the issues in today’s headlines and more, from stem cell research to alternative energy sources to climate change.

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We’ve posted my contribution to the ESP specical issue.

Here it is:

Pielke, Jr., R.A., 2004. When scientists politicize science: making sense of controversy over The Skeptical Environmentalist, Environmental Science & Policy, Volume 7, pp. 405-417.

In April, 2001, Vice President Dick Cheney was criticized for downplaying the role of conservation as a tool of energy policy. He said,

“Now, conservation is an important part of the total effort. But to speak exclusively of conservation is to duck the tough issues. Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it is not a sufficient basis all by itself for sound, comprehensive energy policy. We also have to produce more. The American people have worked very hard to get where they are, and the hardest working are the least likely to go around squandering energy or anything else that costs money. Our strategy will recognize that the present crisis does not represent a failing of the American people.”

This issue was sort of revisited by the New York Times last Sunday in an article about whether or not it is hypocritical for rich environmentalists to be jetting around on their private jets.

The article observes:

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I co-guest edited (woth Steve Rayner) a special issue of the journal Environmental Science and Policy that is just out. The issue is titled “Science, Policy, and Politics: Learning from Controversy Over The Skeptical Environmentalist.” Contributors are Chris Harrison (Cambridge University Press and Editor of The Skeptical Environmentalist), Naomi Oreskes (UCSD), Dan Sarewitz (ASU), Chuck Herrick (Stratus Consulting), and me.

You can find the journal online here and if you can’t access online you can email me for a reprint (pielke@colorado.edu).

Comments welcomed.

In 1998 Chris Landsea and I published a paper that asked how much damage past hurricanes would cause under contemporary societal conditions (i.e., adjusting for changes in population and wealth.) The table below shows these data updated to 2003. The damage estimates for Charley are not yet in, but the storm will have to result in greater than $11.2 billion in damages to break into the top 15 all time and more than $22.9 billion to break into the top 5.

Top 30 Damaging Tropical Storms and Hurricanes in the continental U.S.

Normalized to 2003 dollars by inflation, personal property increases, and coastal county population changes (1900-2003).

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One definition of insanity is repeating the same behavior and expecting different results. The climate debate is full of people who repeat the same behavior but expect different results.

On the one hand we have the self-described skeptics who seem to think that by highlighting uncertainties in science they can turn around the freight train that is public opinion, scientific consensus, and policy maker’s beliefs that human influences on the climate are worth addressing. In an essay published yesterday on TechCentralStation some familiar skeptics write, “The science is settled. The “skeptics” — the strange name applied to those whose work shows the planet isn’t coming to an end — have won.”

I’d ask (or perhaps more accurately, request), does this victory mean that skeptics no longer feel a need to debate the science?

On the other hand are the technocrats who seem to think that solving the climate problem is simply a matter of “tuning” climate policies to the desired concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, presumably via some giant control panel with a big knob labeled (Global Atm. CO2 PPM) that policy makers can set like a thermostat. An example of this sort of view appears in an essay in today’s issue of Science where the authors write that “Humanity can solve the carbon and climate problem in the first half of this century simply by scaling up what we already know how to do.” Examples of such “simple” solutions include:

*Increase fuel economy for 2 billion cars from 30 to 60 mpg
*Add 700 GW (twice the current capacity) of nuclear power
*Decrease tropical deforestation to zero instead of 0.5 GtC/year, and establish 300 Mha of new tree plantations (twice the current rate)

What the technocrats fail to appreciate is that even as “solutions” such as increasing fuel economy, adding nuclear power, and eliminating tropical deforestation may be technologically feasible, seeing their actual implementation represents social and political challenges. Solving poverty, disease, and wars are also similarly “simple.” Overcoming these sorts of challenges are in reality not so simple, irrespective of the state of technology.

So if the climate debate were sane we’d stop arguing about issues of science and technology and instead start talking about society and politics, because we’d recognize that all the discussion of science and technology, no matter what side of the debate you are on is unlikely to lead to improvements in energy policies or a reduction in vulnerability to climate impacts. However, I have a sense that we will continue to debate the science and technology of the climate issue and expect different results than we’ve seen to date.