Bishop Hill Royal Society book prize
Nov 11, 2011 Books Climate: WG2 The Royal Society has shortlisted Jon Turney's Rough Guide to the Future for its annual book prize.
There is a report in the Guardian, which includes this:
The most powerful chapters of Turney's meticulously researched book deal not with far-off scenarios...but the remorseless statistical trends pointing towards a short-term future of rampant population growth, climate crunch, water and food supplies under increasing pressure and dwindling biodiversity.
In 2009, for example, the UK Meteorological Office predicted average warming of 4C if current carbon emission trends continue unchecked. According to the report this will almost certainly happen by the end of the century, but possibly as soon as 2060. The average rise conceals increases of up to 15C in the Arctic, and up to 10C in western and southern Africa, meaning 20% less rainfall in these regions. That rain will fall elsewhere. India will see 20% more rainfall and an increased risk of flooding.
It's interesting to compare this take on the future with Richard Betts' comments here a couple of days back.
Reader Comments (53)
First time I've seen the term "climate crunch" - wonder what it means, and how it differs from the others in the lexicon :)
Richard Betts has a direct responsibility here. He should speak up.
Betts has admitted that the 2K limit is in effect bogus, he does not believe in it.
He has also said that 4K increase is on the extreme range of the Met Office's own forecasts.
We know also that long term and short term trends in the data in places like Arctic and Africa do not show any changes that could be construed extreme.
Time to speak out Richard at the way climate science and your own science is being deliberately misrepresented.
How sad that within a few days of Richard Bett suggesting that the 2 degree mantra is not widely believed amongst 'scientists', The Royal Society award their prize to a book which does believe it, and promote it!. The whole thing is praised in The Guardian – with a side order of argument from authority curtesy of The Met office.
I'm sure the Beeb will be along in a minute. They're probably talking to the author for TV rights.
Plus ca change.
Have patience. These things take time.
Here are Richard Betts own conclusions based on emission scenarios;
Coulds, nears, possibles, best guesses, plausibles, expecteds and especialies?
Compare and contrast with the Guardian report.
The Hockey Stick Illusion would have received my vote. But your book is not about politics, which is what the RS is all about.
I have to say that I despised Betts' comments here recently. It struck me as an attempt at disarming and patronising the opposition of the Met off at a time when they are seeking £millions more for their weather - climate ponzi scheme. Yuk, they make me sick.
Stephen, it depends what you want out of this from them. Surrender and humilation, or a gradual shift to more moderate position? I suggest you won't ever get the former, the real world doesn't work that way.
From Wikipedia:
Yawn.
Stephen, I agree with the BigYin, let's be thankful he's gone on record and is moving his position to a more rational one, admitting the uncertainties and waiting to see what actually happens before taking precipitate action. If you want the scientific community to be more reasonable and responsive you have to give them the wiggle room to get out of the position they've put themselves in. We don't want show trials, just that they start being scientists again, and by that I mean doubtful and careful every step of the way.
I think the Met Office sucks too, it gave up accurate weather forecasting years ago, and no I won't support another big computer for them to help the environmentalists try to frighten our children and make them feel guilty about being human beings.
Spelling mistake -- 'wuz' not 'woz' :)
To be fair to Richard Betts I think this type of utterance is covered by him in the following statement:-
"I prefer to distinguish between "climate scientists" (who are mainly atmospheric physicists) and "climate change scientists" who seem to be just about anyone in science or social science that has decided to see what climate change means for their own particular field of expertise. While many of these folks do have a good grasp of climate science (atmospheric physics) and the uncertainties in attribution of past events and future projections, many sadly do not. "Climate change science" is unfortunately a rather disconnected set of disciplines with some not understanding the others - see the inconsistencies between WG1 and WG2 in IPCC AR4 for example. We are working hard to overcome these barriers but there is a long way to go."
"We are working hard to overcome these barriers but there is a long way to go"
In my view this and previous statements from The Royal Society and its President, aligns them firmly with the "climate change scientists" and emphasises just how long the "long way to go" is.
Oh dear.
If you were of a sensitive disposition, coming anywhere behind that patently banal and credulous twaddle might be a depressing experience.
TheBigYinJames & Stephen Richards
I agree with you both. As you possibly remember, I openly use this blog as research material for my psychodynamic studies. Until Tamsin Edwards and Richard Betts came along, I was getting a little frustrated by the lack in new material to study -- I mean, there is only so much you can do with the thoughtless rantings of a troll.
However, I now have some new insights. Both Tamsin and Richard remind me a great deal of Bill Clinton, who is a very bright but disingenuous person. Tamsin is particularly that way, given her splitting the semantic meaning of "prediction" and "projections".
Be that as it may, they are both interesting and intelligent people -- they are both very much like Bill Clinton. And thus I agree that they attempt at disarming and patronising the opposition of the Met off . But on the same hand, they can not admit that they were flat out wrong. So I also have to agree that
At least they are showing movement in their position. Not as much a Judith Curry, but far more than Mike Mann. Be thankful of that.
Would you really want a prize award by this Royal Society?
Love these comments from Bill McGuire, professor of geophysical hazards at University College London, "Unless we come to our senses soon … my best bet is for a mid-century world defined by environmental degradation, economic breakdown and social chaos."
What odds would PaddyPower give on such a treble?
http://betcalculator.paddypower.com/index.php?bet=Single&number=2
@John Shade
I daresay the £10,000 might have been welcomed by the Bishop.
"a short-term future of rampant population growth"??? Even the rather exaggerated UN population projections see population growing ever more slowly, and peaking by 2070. Existing projections of food supply show that the percentage of underfed people would be minimal even with the "High" UN projection which assumes no demographic peaking but continuing population growth to 15 billion by 2100 (for those interested, see IIASA's food and agriculture projections led by Gunther Fischer, the most authoritative group in this subject). Even a very modest economic growth (one half or one third of the rates observed through the past six, four or two decades) would give practically everyone the income required to cover food needs.
Now just what is a "professor of geophysical hazards", please?
Mike Jackson
I suppose geophysical hazards are when people throw rocks.
Mike Jackson
I suppose also that a professor of geophysical hazards is an expert at throwing rocks.
Tripping over a rock.
Newton must be turning in his grave.
Bill McGuire, professor of geophysical hazards at University College London, "Unless we come to our senses soon … my best bet is for a mid-century world defined by environmental degradation, economic breakdown and social chaos."
I wonder what the gap in the comment was?
Could it be, " ,and I am not making this up,"
So I guy who studies rocks for a living and the hazards they represent to humans has the foresight to predict the end of world is nigh by 2050. It is a little bold or should that be boulder?
Is Bill McGuire secretly wishing we could all go back to the Stone Age.
Flintstones arrested!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRFp_ywDopU
This apocalyptic claimed warming is based on the assumption that the ~2 W/m^2 'forcing' at the end of ice ages is from CO2-GW.
In reality the warming of the southern ocean deeps starts 2000 years before any rise in atmospheric CO2. So, my estimate of CO2 climate sensitivity is that it cannot be more than c. 0.35K with the real warming at the end of ice ages and more recently from the decrease of cloud albedo by aerosols.
Basically, the IPCC scientific consensus is bunkum based on two bad scientific mistakes, one initial error now corrected and since 2004 fraud** to keep it hanging together.
** The fraud has been to claim non-existent increase of cloud albedo from the increase of the water surface area in polluted clouds yet for ~30 years true scientists in climate science have known that high albedo is a large droplet phenomenon. the mechanism is obscure. The 1st AIE is small and the 2nd AIE is the real AGW.
How these jokers got the science so spectacularly wrong is astonishing. Even now Hansen is claiming the 1st AIE has doubled recently when he knows that there is no experimental evidence above noise level. What he doesn't know is worse; because 40% of low level clouds behave differently, the satellite data are wrong as well.
Rather than McGuire, I prefer this
Naturally, Mr Kingsland (author of the Grauniad article) considers this point of view to be "blinkered".Isn’t it fascinating how every AGW commentator can be absolutely sure that history is wrong, completely confident about what the future holds whilst expressing total uncertainty about the present?
Green Sand - best post of the day.
That's interesting, I didn't know they had a prize for fiction.
The 12 listed entries are here
http://royalsociety.org/awards/science-books/longlist/
What possessed the judging panel to pick this one (which can be part preview read on Amazon) and not Matt Ridley's Rational Optimist, defies rational reason. But at least there is the consolation of their surprising comment about Matt's book:
' The judges said: “Reading this book made us all feel more cheerful and provided a welcome counter-balance to some of the distortions of science by the media.”
Perhaps they should reflect not just on that sentiment, but distortions of science in their own hallowed temple.
TheBigYinJames Stephen, it depends what you want out of this from them. Surrender and humilation, or a gradual shift to more moderate position? I suggest you won't ever get the former, the real world doesn't work that way.
That's right. If they move towards a position more based on evidence and realistic assessment, it's good. Demanding that they eat crow pie will not work.
"Would you really want a prize award by this Royal Society?" --John Shade
"And now it's that time in the program where we award our last and greatest honor of the evening, the newest but most-coveted prize of the Royal Society! Yes, I can see you're all thrilled. A little quieter, if you will. May I have the envelope, please? [envelope-being-opened crepitations] I'm so excited...Yes! Ahem. Ladies and gentlemen, this year's winner of the Trofim Lysenko Prize is none other than..."
First time I've seen the term "climate crunch" (TheBigYinJames)
It's a new greenie breakfast cereal. Compare to Filboid Studge in the Saki short story.
No one would have eaten Filboid Studge as a pleasure, but the grim austerity of the advertisement drove housewives in shoals to the grocer's shops to clamour for an immediate supply…
A further advertisement was obtained when an infantry regiment mutinied and shot its officers rather than eat the nauseous stuff…
Does this resemble the greenies?
Saki and Greens
The literary equivalent of a brave new world recipe.
Well they have learned some lesson, make your predictions for a LONG TIME in the future that way there is always possibility they can happen and when it fails to occur no one will remember you made and and you not even likely to be around at the time .
Using my Crystal ball I can tell you at in 200 years times a man will go to Mars and I stand by my words should this fail to happen people can call me a lair to my face.
Now just what is a "professor of geophysical hazards", please?
Nov 11, 2011 at 3:35 PM | Mike Jackson
Maybe he is a Mole Catcher
Be more use if he was as I have too many geophysical hazards, sorry molehills ;)
I suppose the book will be useful for sceptics to quote in fifty years time to counter whichever scare story they are having to debunk by then.
I think that Malthus was unfortunate in that birth control was the thing that he could not have forseen. Without it I would have expected that humans would indeed have bred out of control and that widespread poverty and starvation would have been the result.
Looks like it was run more on the lines of a beauty contest where those that could have an impact on world peace are filtered out because of other considerations.
Meanwhile, it appears that even Bob Ward (ex Royal Society propagandist) and Richard Black (extant BBC propagandist) congratulate Benny Peiser and the GWPF for 'considerable success in getting their point of view across much of the media' according to the Oxford University Report - British Council launch of "Poles Apart: The International Reporting of Climate Scepticism"!!
Link
http://www.thegwpf.org/uk-news/4311-oxford-university-report-gwpf-has-been-very-successful-think-tank.html
"So I guy who studies rocks for a living and the hazards they represent to humans has the foresight to predict the end of world is nigh by 2050. It is a little bold or should that be boulder?"
Nov 11, 2011 at 3:50 PM | Mac
Rocks are a major hazard if you find yourself underneath a falling one. I think your personal world would be nigh. So perhaps Bill McGuire is used to dealing with certainties of outcome :-)
Geophysical hazards are anything from detecting shallow gas (don't want to poke your open hole drill bit into it before setting casing) to shipwrecks, to volcanic vents and seismically active faults, but not crunched climate. That's reserved for Guardian/BBC environmentals.
I'm not sure what is leading people to think this book has won the competition - as far as I can tell it has just been shortlisted. See http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/competition/2011/nov/07/royal-society-prize-science-books for details.
The Royal Society and other scientific organizations co-opted by the green left cannot grant awards to anyone not allied with their scheme to bankrupt the developed and starve the developing world.
Jonathon Jones
Quite right. On checking. The winner is apparently announced on 17 November.
http://royalsociety.org/events/2011-Winton-Prize/
"India will see 20% more rainfall"
Wait a minute! I thought the Indians were supposed to all die of thirst because of the melting glaciers!
Jonathan
YOu are right - I came across the story via a tweet that may have misled me. I've fixed the header post accordingly.
""India will see 20% more rainfall"
Wait a minute! I thought the Indians were supposed to all die of thirst because of the melting glaciers!"
This is AGW, both are true if you want them to be, like warmer wetter winters are the same as colder snowier winters. It's the new Maximum Mechanics. Whatever the state of the climate it's a result of AGW..