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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-CA link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Dear Cecil on the Mountain<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>I want to start my reply with a quote from Larry <a href="http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/about_us/meet_us/max_boykoff/readings/hmielowski_2013.pdf">Ledwick</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>“They are drawing a causal relationship from a casual association. The inverse of their hypothesis is equally likely, ie people who are educated enough in the principles of science to identify shoddy science when it is offered up by global warming adherents are more likely to be conservatives. It also supports the assertion that liberals are more inclined to be followers of causes and not critical thinkers but prefer to defer to authority rather than critically judge issues after examining them in detail, or actively researching the available information.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>The principles I am focusing on are ‘drawing causal relationships from casual association’ and ‘deferring to authority’ (or ‘appealing to authority’) to validate a claim.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Your questions focus on the former. The ‘usual answers’ focus on the latter. Paul O has provided good examples of the latter so please note them.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><b><span lang=EN-US style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"'><o:p> </o:p></span></b></p><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><b><span lang=EN-US style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>></span></b>Perhaps those somebodies at NASA who claim that acid rain is acidifying the ocean - rather than reducing its alkalinity - were simply not paying attention to their high school chemistry because they too were stoned to appreciate the subtle difference between 'more acid' and 'less alkaline'.<span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>The reasons will probably remain unknown. The effect is of course, what matters. When it is NASA that says it, we are supposed to take it ‘on authority’. After all they put men on the moon. The departure of James “death trains” Hansen from NASA is expected to produce some pretty big changes so let’s keep an eye on that. But none of it improves their knowledge of basic chemistry.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>>…</span>so, what are the predictable systemic consequences of an ocean that is becoming less alkaline? <span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>People are of course looking into the past to try to make such predictions. Others are a lot more Hollywood making sciencey-sounding prognostications that are right out of “The Day After” arguably the lowest science-content science fiction movie of all time.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>The oceans have in the remote past been much closer to neutral or even on the other side of it into the slightly acidic zone. Watching the shelled creatures only, they coped fine. That not mean there is any chance in say the next million years we would see an acidic ocean. It is at present not possible to create that.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>></span>Is something that humanity is doing causing coral to blanche and die? <span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Our mutual friend Austin Bowden-Kirby should pop in for that one. There was a casual association between the temperatures in the Western Pacific when there (and other El Nino-unrelated places) was a rise in coral blanching. However the die off was much larger than regional temperature rises. It turns out that die off I speak of (a few years ago) was caused by a virus that attacks the hosted species, which were expelled by the host corals. The recent die back in Florida was caused directly and immediately by cold weather and a sudden drop in ocean temperatures. Coral can take heat but not cold. There are Saudi corals but no Ellesmere Island atolls.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>></span>Are the exhalations and run offs of industrial civilization slowly poisoning the oceans and turning it into an underwater desert? <span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>That is a broad question. The traceable effects involve disposed and processed medicines. I think those effects are real and we need to re-think the health industry. There are underwater deserts but desert researchers would all point to the thriving desert life forms that they study so we need to be careful </span><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:Wingdings;color:#1F497D'>J</span><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>. The biggest threat to the oceans may be the dumping of plastic garbage everywhere. It is amazing how polluted the oceans are with bits of plastic. Perhaps a bug will evolve that attacks plastic and put an end to everything from Lego to latex for good.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>></span>Can you or anybody at NASA scientifically differentiate between the noise of conflicting big data from the tiny signals of a world system under duress and in danger of being destroyed by anthropogenic excesses? <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Absolutely not. That is why there are so many models. The validation of models is a controversial topic. Some say because the elements of a model are individually validated, we can have confidence in the performance of the assemblage. Consider stove testing. We build mathematical pictures of performance using certain measurements. Because we make a proper determination of the temperature if the water in the pot, we might assume that any conclusion drawn from those readings is valid. That of course is where the mistakes are made. If the temperature of a pot stops rising, and heat is still being applied, is heat still being absorbed?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Well, it becomes obvious that the water is boiling and the temperature is not being applied, so we move to measuring the mass of water being evaporated as a measure of heat absorbed. Then inferences are made about the combination of temperature change and mass loss by evaporation. The claims made I this regard underpin claims for ‘heat transfer efficiency’. That is OK as a rough guide, but there are many routes for heat to enter a pot and leave without changing the temperature or evaporating water so as one looks deeper, one sees there are many ‘unmodelled’ complications. It has so happened that in recent years the emergence of char making TLUD stoves has exacerbated the errors in the simple models used for decades and there are serious consequences for the stove section. Stoves that are really IWA tier 1 performers can get a tier 4 rating for something because of defects in the models. It is like that with the climate too. To date there are 73 well known, accessible climate models (GCM’s). Not one of them has predicted the current 200 month stasis in global temperature (indistinguishable from zero change). That means the models are invalidated. The implications are pretty serious.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>></span>I nearly flunked HS chemistry so please keep your answers as simple as possible. <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>></span>What environmental impacts do you think present day climate and oceanic science tells us humanity needs to collectively manage better because there is credible evidence that tiny human generated changes in atmospheric and oceanic conditions have the potential to trigger a cascade of consequences that - oh my God - could or predictably do lead to a collapse of the world's environmental balances to the point where industrial civilization as we know and love it becomes impossible to sustain for billions of humanoids who all want to be affluent western style. <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Deforestation, including the cutting and wholesale replacement of forests by mono-cropped biofuel plantations. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Over-pumping of groundwater reservoirs.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Over-ploughing because it leads to soil loss by water and wind.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Contamination of everything by dumping especially industrial wastes into the ecosystem.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Over-fishing – we do it in the way hunter-gatherers did before they started doing agriculture.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>We have a lot to learn from the African tribe that lives in the Western Sahel who move about every 40 years and plant anew all the trees they need to provide for everything they want to build and eat. They move when the trees take over the local environment. They were attacked in the press by ‘Greens’ who bemoaned the loss of open grazing and leaving in their ‘wake’ a self-sufficient forest full of food and building materials. I guess you can’t please everyone.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'><</span>I remember reading an article from the 1970's written by John Todd, a marine biologist, about Science for the People in which he recounted his awakening to the potential threat of ecocide. He had spent months getting the plants, corals, fish, crustaceans, worms, and micro flora and fauna in a salt water aquarium into a healthy and stable balance. His wife casually tossed a couple of his freshly dry cleaned jackets onto the back of a chair beside the aquarium while he was working at Script Oceanic Institute. The corner of one sleeve of a sports jacket just barely touched the water. When John returned from work in the late afternoon he found everything in his aquarium had died from the carbon tetrachloride cleaning agents used to dry clean his coats. His life as a marine biologist was never the same again because he realized from that moment onward that infinitesimally small changes in oceanic conditions had the power to precipitate massive diebacks affecting entire ecosystems. <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>He began to research what concentrations of carbon tetrachloride and other organo-phosphates interfered with the health of a particular type of fish he knew well and he discovered that their presence in concentrations too dilute for him to measure (back in the early 1970's) interfered with the mating rituals of this species. Its presence made it impossible for the species to reproduce and therefore threatened the survival of this fish species. In fact the inability of these fish to mate - the disruption of their mating behavior - was the only way he could measure the presence or absence of toxic chemicals in concentrations too dilute for the science of that time to measure, monitor and manage. <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>A series of powerful mystical awakenings like this one helped John and several of his colleagues who later joined forces to found the New Alchemy Institute at Woods Hole Massachusetts confront the limitations of science and humanity's ability to control the partially understood consequences of industrial civilization. It was this realization that industrial man is in the same predicament as the sorcerer's apprentice in Walt Disney's Fantasia that eventually led to to the formation of the New Alchemy Institute. The sorcerer's apprentice knows just enough to activate the boomsticks but not enough to turn them off or control a vast army of scientific automatons each mindlessly serving the short run interests of their owners. <o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>That is an interesting story. My wife killed our bright blue pet fish Alphie (a Beta Fish) by putting him in a cup of tap water. <2 ppm chlorine killed it in a few minutes.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>></span>Crispin, check out John Todd's (a fellow Canadian) perspective on the fatal consequences of a tiny amount of CCl4 in a salt water aquarium and perhaps you will be willing to graciously allow more space for the precautionary principle in your climate and ocean science.<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>I have no problem applying the precautionary principle, but it cannot be applied in one direction – everything has an opportunity cost. Should we spend money on reducing indoor PM from cooking fires, or clinics that treat a wide range of diseases? Should we spend money on promoting and researching biological pest controls in Congo or on natural ways to eliminate malaria? There is no shortage of lost opportunities each time resources are expended on something else.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Regards<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Crispin<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div></div></div></body></html>