Computer models, like experiments are very effective when there are fewer variables. However I question the ability of any single organization (or nation) to build an effective model of global climate that can accurately predict weather more than a few weeks into the future. We can predict tides, day and night and identify likely trends like El Nino but we can't accurately predict hurricanes or tornados until "conditions exist". Although I will say that meteorologists are pretty good at predicting their path when they are 24 hours out.
Models also end up reflecting the assumptions of the programmer. So if I say green house gasses will increase x and that they cause temp to rise y, then I will get the results of a calculation, not a simulation.
Many years ago I played a game called Sim Earth where you could affect any conceivable variable. It would let you bump up CO2 levels to those of the dinosaur era or cover the planet with glaciers. However I think it must have had one assumption that AGW models do share, that any given action has diminishing returns as other factors compensate for a given action.
I do agree that efforts should continue to be made to reduce/control stock pollutants however I don't share your fear that CO2 will destroy our planet for future generations. The currently proposed solutions will definitely affect our way of life now.
What better way to tax people than to charge them for air (like in Total Recall)? And if the government doesn't directly collect the money it isn't a tax but rather a source of wealth! I am not saying everyone that supports AGW wants this but I am sure that there are many non-belivers who are using this to start their own politically controlled industry. So what happens to science when it is being affected by politics?
Once upon a time, in the 20th century, science could define problems narrowly.
Scientific experiments still try to do that. Scientists try to isolate the single variable being tested to be certain their results are valid.
But partly thanks to computer modeling, many scientists are now working on entire systems. The human body is a system. A city is a system. The Earth is a system.
The whole idea of a smarter planet is to use our computing power and the scientific method to solve the problems of systems.
Analyzing genetic code is a massive undertaking, but we can do it now. Analyzing regional transportation is difficult, but doable. Analyzing global climate patterns is also massive, but possible.
The result of using a systemic approach is that you come up with systemic solutions. You need to stop smoking, cut down your drinking, exercise and live right if you’re to stay healthy. Cities must be run as regions, political divisions notwithstanding. We have to reduce carbon dioxide if we’re to keep the planet temperate.
When people hear such enormous, inconvenient conclusions they rebel. The mechanism for rebellion is politics.
In politics you don’t have to be proven right. You engage in a form of show business. You distill complex problems into simple slogans. You build coalitions to achieve power.
Three decades ago, in college, I was a political science major. This was at a time when data, especially survey data, was ascendant. The hope was you could actually make political science scientific.
You can’t. Politics is as much art as science. It is not based entirely on reason, but on emotion, and manipulation.
Today’s political divides are all about this. One side says the world is complex, that systems are complex, and that solutions must be too. The other side calls this “big brother,” and calls for simple answers based on principle.
Ideology, cry the system heads. Elitist, cry the principled.
In the past, science or scientists could easily take either side in political debates. They still can, but only by putting science, engineering, and computing to one side before stepping into the arena.
Systems are the ultimate inconvenient truth. Systems are complex, and any simple solution risks unintended consequences. Fine adjustments and moderation are called for when dealing with complex systems.
Yet at the same time climate scientists see the Earth’s system collapsing. For the last few decades they have been very unscientific in their advocacy for enormous changes in mankind’s systems for creating and using energy, in order to prevent catastrophe.
Right now, in Copenhagen, scientists are trying to grab the political wheel, knowing that life as we know it is at imminent risk from the go-slow of politics as usual. In response their calls have been politicized. They have been politicized, twisted into caricatures, by people who know that no is always simpler than yes.
Except in this case no means death. We have to treat the system. We can’t just treat the symptoms. We have to change course. Politics as usual will kill our grandchildren.
Which means anyone who accepts science finds themselves in a political shouting match with interest groups and ideologues who don’t accept the basic premise on which our activism is based.
Smarter planet, meet stupider planet.
