The power of verification in science

If a single new result clashes with the consensus, it's wise to doubt it

Posted by Andrew Dessler (Guest Contributor) at 10:07 AM on 01 Apr 2007

Read more about: climate | climate science

Science is a collective, multi-layered process consisting of three steps. First is the individual scientist testing hypotheses according to the norms of their field. Second, the results of the individual scientist undergo peer-review and are published for the community to evaluate. At this point a result may be considered preliminary, but not proven.

Third, important claims are then re-tested in the "crucible of science" -- they are either reproduced by independent scientific groups or they have their implications tested to insure consistency with the existing body of scientific knowledge. After enough tests/reproductions, a consensus emerges that the idea is correct.

In the end, claims that are repeatedly verified by the scientific community (e.g., the earth is warming, DNA is a double-helix, CFCs destroy ozone) eventually come to be accepted as true.

The key point here is the importance of repeated testing. After an idea is sufficiently well tested, people accept it and move on. While such a scientific consensus might turn out to be wrong, for important and well-tested ideas (e.g., smoking causes cancer, the earth is warming), it's exceedingly unlikely.

Similarly, claims that have not been repeatedly verified must be viewed with caution. Why? Because they might turn out to be wrong.

A great example of this is unfolding right now. A recent analysis of the latest ocean observations (2003 to 2005) showed a decrease in the ocean heat content over those years. This result is puzzling and suggests that much of what we think should be happening to our climate due to the build-up of greenhouse gases is wrong.

Those opposed to the IPCC's view of global warming have seized on this single new result like my dogs go for bones.

Roger Pielke Sr.'s blog, for example, featured this result seemingly daily in his quixotic quest to cast doubt on the IPCC's interpretation of the science.

Recently, however, this statement was posted on Pielke Sr.'s site:

We have been informed today, however, that a correction will be completed soon on this paper in which the recent cooling trend will be removed.

In other words, the problematic cooling trend looks to be wrong.

I'm not an expert on these data, and I don't know whether the trend will turn out to be correct or not (though I suspect the smart money is on "not"). The important point is this: a new result that seems to overturn a confident conclusion of the scientific community is probably wrong.

For example, we should be skeptical of a new study that shows smoking does not cause cancer. And we should be similarly skeptical of new studies that suggest that the earth is not really warming.

Such studies might eventually turn out to be correct, but the odds are long. Before you accept a claim from such a study, you should wait for the result to be verified a few times. You'll probably be waiting for a long, long time.

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11 Comments | Post a Comment

Jumping The Gun

My criticism is that yes, science does "coalesce" around a working theory, but the whole Anthropogenic Global Warming was rammed through society not by scientists, but by pundits, policy makers and politicians (nod to Spiro T. Agnew there).

I would suggest that these times, with regard to climate science, are more like the turn of the 19th century with regard to quantum effects. There were all kinds of ideas floating around, there was Maxwell, and Laplace and Lorentz...all of who had some key ideas and data. There were ideas that were trumped up and failed, like the famous "N-ray" charade as well!

Even after Einstein, scientists were still searching for the "Theory of Everything". There was one very embarassing moment where one famous physicist called a press conference to announce he had solved some equations for a Theory of Everything...and he later had to back track after he found his calculations inadequate.

So, when things seem shakey, and major data is still being collected, now is not the time to rush to a conclusion and start barking at anyone who seeks to challenge it. A great theory is so right, so beyond the ordinary, that skeptics, critics and supporters are all equally awed.

This is not the case for AGW.

J. Bailo Participant Texeme.Construct()

by jabailo at 7:31 PM on 01 Apr 2007

True

But Science can never truely prove anything.
It can only disprove things.

There will always be some degree of uncertainty.

Me I've been digging pretty deep in this stuff recently and so far I'm convinced AGW is real.

Perhaps the most obvious reasons being that

And the surface, obviuosly is warming.
Troposphere is warming, not cooling (new info as of April 2006)

http://www.greyfalcon.net/forcing2.png

3. The Stratosphere is cooling
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/11/the ...
http://www.atmosphere.mpg.de/enid/20c.html

This all lines up with the CO2 theory (Or potentially an Tropospheric Ozone increase, but then again, that'd also come from burning fossil fuels)
http://www.greyfalcon.net/forcing2.png
_

All the compelling studies show that the "Medieval Warm Period" was colder than the 1940s.

http://www.globalwarmingart.com/wiki/Image:2000_Year_Temp ...

But perhaps the most compelling piece of evidence is that we haven't had an increase is solar radiation for the past 6 decades.

http://www.greyfalcon.net/solar.png

Sure there's always the potential it's wrong.

But there's also the potential that I'll get struck down by a meteor before I hit this Post button.

To our best knowledge,
all the evidence points toward AGW,
and away from natural forcing.

And we're not going to get much more certain until it's already too late to do anything about it.

by GreyFlcn at 7:47 PM on 01 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Oops

Heh meant to post this, instead of doubleposting forcing2.png

http://www.greyfalcon.net/forcing.png

by GreyFlcn at 7:51 PM on 01 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Elegant as a La-Z-Boy

Once again, looking at this chart...I just see a muddle of factors retrofitted to try and make a broken theory make sense.

True physics is elegant.

E=mc(2)
Electrons move in quantized states
Entanglement is represented by the negative quantity in our equations of quantum spin (http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath521/kmath521.htm)

What you present is not elegant, or clear.

And as far as solar irradiance, the theory of Svensmark, which I find far more convincing than anything presented by the AGWs is that cosmic ray activity affects formation of low level clouds, which in turn affect the amount of solar radiance which affects heat.

In other words, it's the Sun.

Very clear.

Very clean.

And probably true.

J. Bailo Participant Texeme.Construct()

by jabailo at 9:24 PM on 01 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Uhm. No.

Except that Cosmic ray theory just keeps getting proven wrong.
http://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Publications/PDF_Pap ...

The trend data just doesn't hold up.
http://www.realclimate.org/images/cr.jpg

For more detail:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/10/tak ...

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/03/cos ...

by GreyFlcn at 2:35 AM on 02 Apr 2007

We Handled That

Svensmark already handed Laut's (now dated, 2002) criticisms in a response. I notice that you suppressed that.

As far as the "blog post" response -- I await the same in a peer reviewed scientific journal.

J. Bailo Participant Texeme.Construct()

by jabailo at 8:21 AM on 02 Apr 2007
[ Parent ]

Monkeys

This talk of rushing to a conclusion is rather funny considering the body of scientific data has been put together over the last decades. The theory of GHg goes back a few hundred years. The desperation with which some people try to pin the observed warming effect on anything but GHG is starting to get a bit like ID and creationism. AH! If evolution is true why are there still monkeys!? That level. It's a shame...

by MarkUK at 7:40 AM on 03 Apr 2007

Court of law

Mark-

Your comparison with ID is apt in another way. If you go to a public debate between an ID'er and a credible scientist, the ID'er often wins by distorting, misrepresenting, or outright dissembling. But when ID and science went head-to-head in a court of law, where such tactics were not allowed, the ID'ers got creamed.

I'd like to see GHGs and solar/natural variability/etc. face off in a court of law. I suspect that GHGs would win, and win big.

Thanks!

by Andrew Dessler at 8:41 AM on 03 Apr 2007

Andrew,

I'd like to see GHGs and solar/natural variability/etc. face off in a court of law. I suspect that GHGs would win, and win big.

I suspect you're right, but I take absolutely no comfort in that fact. After all, our goal here is not (just) to be correct to but to move public opinion and spur action. Perhaps in a tightly constrained, moderated debate environment we win the day, but that doesn't matter much if we lose in actual debates as they actually occur in the wild.

Your admission that IDers (and climate denialists) win public debates smacks of fatalism. Why must it be so? Are good rhetoric and effective persuasion incompatible with truth? I like to think not.

As you've probably noticed, this is just a compressed version of this longer post.

grist.org

by David Roberts at 10:10 AM on 03 Apr 2007

Education, Education, Education...

Andrew,

You are absolutely right...

I think that just like with ID the key thing is education. Yet, you have to accept I think that there will always be a part of the population that is going to deny science. I find it interesting that they use the same debating tactics.

I find it also interesting that people who are perfectly able of rational scientific thought in other areas completely lose it when it comes to global warming. Seems political views cloud judgement more than anything else.

Just keep going and going. I think more and more people are getting it. Now we need to get our leaders to take responsible action.

by MarkUK at 12:46 PM on 03 Apr 2007

dogs in wingback chair

Lovely photo, Andrew, of your Weimeramers (?) in that floral-print chair. They do not seem quite snuggled in, but no doubt they can find for themselves satisfactory positions round about the house, here or there. Meanwhile, they are posing very nicely, and the colors of the shot are great.

Curiously, the subject of the pet-food recall has been ignored in Grist. There was something about a recent danger in baby food, which was fine, but nothing about this crisis regarding what is safe to feed our animal companions.

And yet, the way several independent labs are going about isolating the harmful ingredient in manufactured pet food is a good example of how science proceeds, the subject of this thread. The NY State Department of Agriculture earlier on identified a chemical used as a rat poison; later, that could not be confirmed by a fed lab, or by a lab at Cornell. A lab in NJ is also at work. A plastic component has subsequently been identified. ...

The more profound scientific question is how the pollutant ingredient is understood to affect the vulnerable species (cats being apparently especially vulnerable). And just too little is known, apparently. No idea, who all are involved in that research, and how they are going about it. Needless to say, experimentation with live animals is problematic.

Why is transparency in scientific research so embarrassing? Why do we not understand that that is a great moral weakness of our civilization?

I would think, after this case, the veterinarians should feel at least a bit of embarrassment here. Whatever, let us hope this episode opens up the pet food industry to greater scrutiny than ever before.

And, more centrally, the way this discussion, on the lethal pet food, is proceeding is a great illustration of how science works. How it typically works. How it ought to work? -- well, you decide.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 4:02 AM on 04 Apr 2007

ADVERTISING POLICY

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