[danielharan]

Imagine being a scientist, and your models show a billion people could die soon.

How would you take it if people told you: "You're such an alarmist. Shut up, and keep working on your models"

And if scientists shouldn't speak up, who is left in public discourse?

[kaybe]

Clearly. The question is whether shouting 'Do something! here's a list of ideas and we'll check everything else you can come up with. DO SOMETHING!' counts as intenting to do policy as the parent says.

The data is very scary. Seeing the conditions of the distant past makes me not want to repeat them. Before a scientist, I am a human being.

Parent - seriously, what do you want us to do? Sit back, take more data, calculate more models, write some papers that only other scientists read? You, everyone, pays us for doing this, and it's our responsibility to make you listen.

(Now, I'm quite young. My professors seem to have given up, one even said so. I sincerely hope it's not as bad as it looks.)

[newnewnew]

The data is extremely scary. Global temperature trends are about to drop out of the bottom of the 95% confidence interval for academic climate predictions[1]. Do we really want to live in a world where people are not whipped up into an environmentalist hysteria?

[1] http://media.economist.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/29...

[kaybe]

Cool, best possible outcome. Now if only we understood all the feedback mechanisms.. so what is your actual proposal? No change of course? Gentle change of course? There are a lot of responses that are not hysteria. (And a very genereral term you chose there, since many of the problems are only loosely related as of now. Recycling won't really help, for example.)

[nsxwolf]

Understand that you are scientists in the real world and not in a Roland Emmerich movie.

You can warn and warn all you like, but if people don't listen, it's because they're free people who have made their own decisions through the political process. The answer is not to scream louder. They heard you, and don't care.

Want to end the debate on global warming? Make it moot. Turn your research into great products and technologies that reduce carbon emissions and are simultaneously what people want.

It's already happening: People are starting to want a Tesla S because it's considered by many to be the best car ever made. They're actually getting customers who don't give a rats ass about the environment, and that's exactly what you're going to need if you really want to save the world.

[danielharan]

Oh, so one minute you say all those climate modellers should shut up and do more science, the other, they should spend a few years learning to be automative engineers?

We don't debate gravity through the political process. We can discuss how to tackle climate change, but that itself is not debatable.

And if they defend it, it's because it's under attack. The industry FUD would have many believe that it's the scientists that have a vested interest.

[nsxwolf]

No. My point is only that scientists are not a 4th branch of government.

We don't debate global warming through the political process, nor should we. We debate what we might want to do about global warming through the political process. Your comment indicates you don't see the difference, and that's exactly what I'm worried about.

You're not granted political power simply for being right. Imagine if a new consensus was reached amongst economists that the minimum wage is bad for the economy, and were granted the power to eliminate it. I don't think too many here would be happy about that.

[danielharan]

Oh, I understand it all too well.

In my experience, all the critics of the science want NO action taken, except more science and R&D. Or even in Canada, the shuttering of scientific projects that could be inconvenient.

[kaybe]

Sure, and I'm not trying to control what is being done. If everyone decides that they are fine with a world a few degrees warmer, ok. Nothing I can do. I just want to push for something, for politics to act on the knowledge gained.

A scientist is also a citizen - I don't see where you give away whatever marginal power you have as a member of the public. Everyone can push for the things they value, it's a democracy.

[kaybe]

And.. it's just sad. You know, there are many people who have never heard of the concept. They're the ones to be hit first, and they don't even have democratic governments. Should we ignore them?

The data points at the sea rising - flat islands without money for dykes will disappear. Models consistently predict changing precipitation patterns - which is ok if you have money to migitate the changes.

I don't want to dismiss your whole comment, you do have a point. I'll happily pay money in subsidies to create a solar industry which can then be copied by everyone. However, as you also say, it's not enough to solve this with science and technology. If we were still in the middle of the last century, it maybe would. It's a political problem now which has to be solved with politics by politicians and citizens, and not by scientists. And as I said in another comment, every citizen has the right to push for his believes to be taken into account.

[danielharan]

Yeah, my env. sci professor in 1st year was a climate scientist who had pretty much given up.

Even though he was getting a shit wage, he still had to endure those who thought it was people like him, rather than the Exxon and Shells of this world, that had a vested interest.

[tomjen3]

If I were that scientists I would publish every scrap of paper I had and say please do something or prove me wrong. I wouldn't flip that somebody leaked something I was writing - I would make damn sure that there were nothing at all to leak.