The George Will Disinformation Campaign

George Will has a thing against science.   I’d say I’m not sure why, but it wouldn’t be true. I am pretty sure why Will abhors the idea that on a practical level we should take sensible steps to arrest atmospheric greenhouse gas concentration buildup, among other environmental problems. (Update: see this typical comment to a Discover Magazine article exposing Will, where the reader can not fathom his motivations. This is why understanding what drives manipulations on the part of Will which obviously carry a lot of appeal — including to newpaper editors who seem to confusedly think that misrepresentation and falsity in the name of a “contrarian view” is balance and provocativeness — is so important. When it is understood what drives it, it can be sensibly addressed, rather than dismissed as inexplicable “lying” “manipulation” or “weirdness,” which does little to help inform those that have been so mislead and improve the level of the national discussion and debate on the issue.)

Will thinks these steps cost “money,” lots of money (in that estimation, a lot of other people agree). What he does not see is that “money” is just a reflection of total GDP, and that anything we “spend” also goes toward the GDP, just in a different direction.  Solving the climate change problem does not undermine long term economic growth. It changes the nature of it.  [Update:  See this link, which explores this concept further.]

Will, it would seem, can’t comprehend that at all. He also thinks it is an interminable violation of inherent rights to make polluting more expensive. He thinks there is an inherent right to pollute (since the earth is so “large” and all that, it all must simply disappear anyway), but there is no inherent right for every individual to be reasonably free of someone else’s pollution unduly impinging upon them.

Both are rights.  Heretofore, our approach has presumed the former is absolute, the latter abstract. But these presumptions were formulated and bred deeply into our mindset before we even had any sense of the possibility of environmental damage or harm, and when we were industrializing (an age we are rapidly moving from, into the information and services age.) Will simply can not adapt. And really does not want to.

Thus, like an impetulant child, he steadfastly refuses not only to refrain from writing on a  subject on which he is so biased it is almost comical, he also makes no effort to arrest those biases (and neither do those who continue to publish his drivel, either), or to try and learn.  As a result, he continues, time and time again, when it comes to matters of science or the environment, to mislead and misinform. And this is fairly significant, due to his national syndication and overwhelming acceptance by our mainstream media presses as a “commentator for the ages.”

Will no longer takes to simply denying that there can be a phenomenon such as climate change — apparently convinced, not by the fact that heat trapping gas concentrations are rising at breakneck speed, geologically speaking, and that ultimately, heat drives climate, that climate patterns do not shift on arithmetic or neatly predictable curves, and that any data that would be probative would likely be after the fact, but by all the data in support of a very general warming trend,and projections that predict overall continued warming trends.

But what he does to is everything possible to play tortured games with the facts, with the logic, and with the science. That is, not to promote genuine disagreement, devil’s advocacy, and provocative alternatives, but simply to try and undermine in any way he can, any idea that widespread and  harmful long term ecological and biological change is likely to result from continuing to increase ambient atmospheric heat trapping gas concentrations; or, barring that, any idea that it is worthwhile to do something about it.

His latest effort, while not quite as horrific as some of this others, is still a veritable hodge podge of misleading insinuations and patently false reasonings. Essentially, Will finds great solace in the idea that some scientists are predicting shorter cooling trends because of ocean patterns, and takes great joy in what he seems to believe  is the clever idea that scientists and others concerned about climate change are very saddened by this seemingly good, but essentially irrelevant, short term news.

That is, Will misses the fact that it is speculative. Will misses the fact that it would likely be short term. Will misses the fact that climate is extremelycomplex, not a symetrically predictable mathematical equation. Will misses the fact that climate change does not and can not mean that underlying variability in climate, overall change aside, suddenly disappears. Will misses the fact, regardless of all the observations “supporting” climate change guestimations,and a few others questioning it ,  that heat drives climate, and in the long run, with more heat trapped in the atmosphere, climate will change — and Will misses the fact that this latter effect, while not on a straight, or short term symetrical, curve, will likely accelerate, as concentrations shift rapidly away from the norm.  And, most importantly of all, Will misses the fact that the evidence of exactly what this experiment is we are conducting on the atmosphere, as sure as the sun rises, will come after its cause has been long implemented, not before.

Vintage Will (emphasis added):

By asserting that the absence of significant warming since 1998 is a mere “plateau,” not warming’s apogee, the Times assures readers who are alarmed about climate change that the paper knows the future and that warming will continue: Do not despair, bad news will resume.

Suddenly 1) Will is the expert on climate change; 2) most science is thrown out the window, as the great bulk of scientific consensus is both hooey and irrelevant; 3) the underlying science — namely, greenhouse, “heat trapping” gas concentrations have risen by close to 40 percent since the start of the industrial age, with much of that in the last few decades>>they have risen and continue to rise, as a result of very specific anthropomorphic activities>>heat drives climate — is now also irrelevant; 4) the fact that ocean current and shorter global patterns play overwhelming roles on shorter term climate activity is now similarly irrelevant.

And why?  Because 1998, you see, was the apogee, of any ongoing radical greenhouse gas alteration’s effect!!  And it is so despite the fact that there is nothing to indicate this empirically. And most importantly of all, it indicates this despite the fact that there can not be, anything to indicate this empirically, because the effect is longer term, not geometric, and lags terribly behind its precipitating cause.

But somehow, Will, whose entire piece is filled with these little “innuendo” like and ridiculously misleading distortions, decided that the perceived –and still speculative shorter term ocean circulatory effect on climate, means that 1998 might mean we’re done. And, why if suddenly a rash of 20 or so years of increasingly wild, violent and hot weather ensues, but then for 5 or 10 or so there is little change, why, we’ll be done then too!

These formulations rely upon the work of Mojib Latif, who, as Will at least mentions, advocates policies to address climate change.  Joseph Romm — who writes the usually thoroughly researched climate blog, climateprogress.org — spoke with Dr. Latif on Thursday:

“We don’t trust our forecast beyond 2015″ and “it is just as likely you’ll see accelerated warming” after then . Indeed, in his published research, rapid warming is all-but-inevitable over the next two decades. He told me, “you can’t miss the long-term warming trend” in the temperature record, which is “driven by the evolution of greenhouse gases.”  Finally, he pointed out “Our work does not allow one to make any inferences about global warming.”

For more on what Latif’s work means, see Romm’s piece. And for the record, with all due respect, I don’t trust Latif’s formulations before 2015.  We can’t predict the weather very accurately three days in advance, and there are simply too many variables that interact, and too many amplifying assumptions, to be able to model anything climate wise beyond basic pattern parameters.

However, the underlying, and seemingly reasonable, gist of his work is that ocean current changes play a dynamic role, and may have a shorter term cooling effectd. What this also points to is something else, very elemental,  that Will not only completely misses, but uses his ignorance on therein, to essentially and ridiculously mock everything else. And that is, as noted above, climate change does not mean that shorter term variability in climate will suddenly cease. Will takes the ridiculous idea that it does, to create the novel idea that therefore 1998 (even though it has gotten slightly warmer since) might be the apogee, and the NY Times, by not “telling its readers this, is thus playing right into this crazy idea that almost all scientists have, that heat drives climate, and increasing heat trapping gases, long term, very likely drives climate increasingly upward.    

Romm, by the way, was an assistant Secretary at the U.S. Department of Energy in the 90s,  in charge of the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, and is the author of several books, including two on how businesses can reduce their environmental impact and improve profits.  His latest, 2006’s “Hell and High Water,” according to Technology Review, “provides an accurate summary of what is … a sensible agenda for technology and policy, and a primer on how political disinformation has undermined climate science.”

Will serves as a perfect example, of precisely this.

Another great mistake Will makes is to stereotype the great bulk of the scientific consensus and concern over the issue, into nothing other than hand wringing alarm and panic — what he terms “Cassandras.”  I am not saying here that such alarm is assuredly wrong – I don’t know, nor do I think that anyone can know.  I do know that there is a reasonable probability that there will be multiple ecological “threshold” effects (or “tipping points”)  reached, where after long periods of seemingly little or random change, whole scale systemic change (typically very negative or destructive) will erupt or ensue;  it is the way nature works. And I also know, and it is fairly elemental science, that radically altering the heat trapping chemical composition of the atmosphere in what is, from a geologic perspective, an almost instantaneous period, is the classic type of system impact that would produce such effects.  (It also seems possible, since we are really not doing much about a challenge that needs to be relevantly addressed, that so called “Cassandras,” while perhaps playing somewhat into far right wing stereotpying, may at least be alerting people to the need to pay attention to the issue. )

But Will appeats to takes great comfort in such seemingly extreme, and or obviously hyperbolic statements as the following one he recites, with great glee, that Prince Charles, back in March, apparently uttered, stating therein that we had until 2017 to prevent ”catastrophic climate change and the unimaginable horrors that this would bring.”

For the reasons that have been exhaustively illuminated, in countless studies — not to mention basic common sense — the time to act on climate change is yesterday, and significantly.  (And what Charles was likely referring to is the fact that given current atmospheric concentrations,and the persistency of these gases in the atmosphere, our window for the most proactive period where we can still potentialy avoid a great deal of unnecessary harm, may be about 8-10 years or so.)  But Will otherwise misses the fact that the issue of apparent hyperbole in Prince Charles’ statement is irrelevant to the larger challenge that we face.  Thus, he instead, and falsely, and turns statements such as that by Prince Charles’ into THE issue, concluding his claptrap piece thus:

Charles Moore of the Spectator notes that in July, the prince said that by 2050 the planet will be imperiled by the existence of 9 billion people, a large portion of them consuming as much as Western people now do. Environmental Cassandras must be careful with their predictions lest they commit what climate alarmists consider the unpardonable faux pas of denying that the world is coming to an end.

So a few people (over?) hype the climate change thing — maybe they are right, maybe they are wrong — and suddenly the great bulk of scientists and others who have studied the issue, and contend, unlike Will, that it is foolish to continue conducting an enormous experiment on planet earth with geologically radical alteration in heat trapping (and thus climate driving) gases, are suddenly Cassandras charged, according to Will with the fervent and unshakeable belief that the world is coming to an end.  And an end that it is coming (silly as the first notion is) despite anything we try to do to try and improve the situation, which would be the point of the few true “climate change” Cassandras, of trying to prevent in the first place.  Will also misses the obvious metaphor. We will adjust, but why largely destroy the basic ecology of our environment, and possibly flood large swaths of continents?

In what is still the very same column, Will also commits yet another, fundamental, and quite extraordinary, error.  After raving on, with sarcastic, highly misleading, and even more misinformed, half quips every step of the way, Will tries to assert, essentiallly, that there is all this “conflicting” evidence out there and we don’t know what to do! So then he writes, thus:

America needs a national commission appointed to assess the evidence about climate change.

It is worded a little bit differently, but isn’t this easily recognizable? 

The basic driving scientific reasoning for action is the same today as it was nine years ago when the Bush Administration first took office — though perhaps with nine more years of continued rapid buildup the problem is simply grander, and somewhat more urgent given the increasing difficulty and not too far off impossibility of significant reversal. (And, overall, some short term empirical evidence has made this more evident to some.)

Bush had esssentially pledged to address climate change, then once in office decided, quite famously now, that the issue needed “more study.”  By the time Bush was close to leaving office, he had switched back.  Now, with nine more years of buildup, and the accumulation even of some rather compelling but unnecessary empirical data, George Will has finally graduated from the school of complete science denial, to the simple reactionary positions of nine years past.

And that is, “the issue needs more study.”

Will might not be enough of a scientist to grasp this statement, but for a newspaper editor who continues to publish’s his almost “religiously” driven anti science screeds, consider this:  By the very nature of this problem, by the time we will no longer need to “study it,” the problem will have manifested itself, and the earth will be very dramatically, and unalterably, different.

If Will wants to make the case that that “difference” is going to be exciting (and fun!) that is one thing.  While many might disagree, it is subjective, and people are entitled to their opinions regarding what “matters.”  Ecological havoc might not matter to Will, who seems to exist in a bizarre world (and this is a watered down version of the original version of this monstrosity of a piece).  But to play games with the complex nature of trying to forecast, with precision, what is, with precision, an unforecastable thing, and then leapfrog back in time to a position that was reactionarily ridiculous back then when the matter was pressing, but not as pressing as now — is voodoo logic.  Yet it is precisely the type of thing that Will, when it comes to matters of science, and the environment, has become quite practiced at the art of.

Perhaps he should consider writing about politics, instead. Or, and here’s just an idea — opening a few science books.  And reading them.

And then, maybe, throwing on a pair of jeans (see his closing parenthetical at the end, it just about says it all), and going out and doing some work with his hands, for once. Looking up at the sky, and mountains. Maybe it will open his eyes.  If it doesn’t, once again, hopefully those of the editors at our county’s municipal newspapers’ will be.  To borrow liberally from a Paul Krugman column back on September 10, 2004 regarding budgetary math, and apply it here, Will science: 2 – 1 = 4.  He’s not just wrong, he’s peddling misinformation, and detracting, not adding, to the discussion and debate.