Chuck Niederriter on Climategate |
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OurBlook interview with Chuck Niederriter, professor of physics, Gustavus Adolphus College.
CN: Not in my opinion. It does reveal some human failings, but no real problems with the work supporting climate change. Even before the "exhaustive" review of the leaked e-mails by the Associated Press, there was plenty of proof in the peer reviewed journals. This seems to be just a red herring timed to raise concerns before the Copenhagen conference.
Do you think the behavior of the leading scientists involved at Penn State and East Anglia meets an ethical standard you are proud of? CN: Not in all cases. But, I am not privy to all of the details and it wouldn't be appropriate for me to judge them. They will, however, be judged by their institutions, granting agencies and peers in their field.
Do you view this affair as a serious matter or a minor blip that will soon pass? CN: As I said above, I view this as a red herring, a minor blip that will soon pass. The theft of the e-mails did inspire some other "scientists" to break the rules. After several years of fighting the American Physical Society's statement on climate change, one of the several noted climate change skeptics apparently gained illegal access to the entire APS mailing list and sent out several e-mails stating that they had been ignored in their attempt to change the APS statement. In fact, the APS had carefully reviewed their concerns and chose not to change the statement when it was officially released.
In light of this affair, should the public have any confidence in what's called the "scientific community's consensus" that a global warming trend exists? CN: Not in my opinion. The number of unrelated scientists who have published their work in peer reviewed journals that support the IPCC conclusions is overwhelming. I think I saw a count somewhere, but don't recall where. If the scientists at East Anglia and Penn State were the only ones who had studied climate change, I'd be worried. But that is certainly not the case.
Should whoever unearthed and published these private e-mails be viewed as a criminal or a conscientious whistleblower? CN: In my opinion, it was a crime to steal the e-mails. It is also a crime to falsify data. In the event that there was no other way to prove that something illegal was going on, it might be appropriate to reduce the penalty for the e-mail theft. But, there still isn't proof that the data were falsified. The only thing that is clear to me is that these scientists were assuming that their e-mails were secure when candidly discussing the issues.
Is there anything else you'd like to say about this subject? CN: I find it interesting that we will evacuate an airport or a school if an anonymous caller reports that there is a bomb inside. We don't spend time checking to find out if the caller is being truthful. It isn't worth the risk to do so. In the event there really is a bomb inside, there would be a catastrophe. But, in this case, some members of society are willing to take the risk. I would note that most of those have little to loose directly, although the effects on the Third World would trigger major problems for all of us on the Earth. There are obvious differences between the bomb example and climate change. Clearly the scale of the loss is much greater and so are the costs. But, I still think it gives us a way to think about the problem.
Prof. Niederriter is the director of the Nobel Conference at Gustavus Adolphus. The conference has a different theme each year and has two goals: to bring cutting-edge science issues to the attention of an audience of students and interested adults; and to engage the panelists and the audience in a discussion of the moral and societal impact of these issues. Trackback(0)
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Are there any aspects of the scientists' e-mails revealed in Climategate that the public should be concerned about?
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I want the future to be better than the past. I don't want it contaminated by the mistakes and errors with which history is filled. We should all be concerned about the future because that is where we will spend the remainder of our lives.