I saw this happen circa 2008 on an online tool that NASA used to have that showed a graphical representation of the earth with shaded anomaly data layed over the top. It was satellite data. You could choose any month from history and with a single click advance or go back month by month, or year by year.

I wrote an article that year using screenshots from the online tool showing that very little warming was happening anywhere in the southern hemisphere and how most of the warming in the northern hemisphere was concentrated where there was snow on the ground for some or all of the year. I then linked to pre-IPCC AR1 study by James Hansen where he concluded that black carbon (soot) was responsible for about a third of global warming. I actually backed him up on that except I thought he might have been conservative about how much of the effect was from black carbon. I’ve since concluded that he was probably right about the 33% and that CO2 is preferential in a way that resembles where soot settles and persists. CO2 has its strongest effect where there is the least surface water available for evaporation.

At any rate after publishng that article I went back several months later to review it again and when I clicked on the link to the NASA tool I noticed the display had undergone quite a change. No longer did it show much of the southern hemisphere mostly in the light blue (slight cooling) but rather in light pink (slight warming) and the northern hemisphere had been turned to a darker shade of pink with the Arctic a deep red.

Several months after that the tool disappeared altogether from NASA’s site.

These adjustments occur regularly and they all served to make what’s become a comical expression of derision “It’s worse than we thought” toward the ass clowns making the adjustments.

Taken in the context of what was promised vs. what was delivered as a result of sequencing the human genome over 10 years ago the statement to which you object is not out of line. It was thought before the sequence was complete that having it would quickly pinpoint the cause and cure for a whole raft of congenital and non-congenital disease alike. Nothing even close to the promise has transpired. The human genome turned out to be one f*ck of a lot more complicated that anyone imagined back in the day when gene-centric paradigm dominated all the thinking. Now that we know so-called junk-DNA is actually doing things and the one-gene-one- protein paradigm has been shattered by frame shifted and backward transcription, transcription editing, RNA editing, micro-RNA regulation, and who knows much I’m forgetting to mention because I stopped studying it several years ago. We were very naive about biological complexity in the past. We’ve gone from cells being blobs of protoplasm in Darwin’s time to a single cell being more complex than a space shuttle plus the launch & recovery facilites, plus all the infrastructure that goes into producing every bit and widget that goes into a space shuttle. The global gene database takes a supercomputer to crunch through now.

And keep in mind it’s all just an accident. All this mind boggling complexity at the molecular level is just the result of a random dance of atoms. No design. Just happenstance. We’re just really lucky to be here to scrutinize it. Not.

What happens here is that science ( the behavior of scientists and institutions CHANGES ) the perception that values and self interest is driving the science increases. the idea of waiting for uncertainty to be resolved through a deliberative process starts to be questioned.

During the 2010 eruptions of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland, the (ash cloud) science did *not* change. There was a hell of a lot of completely unreasonable (and reprehensible) pressure *on* these scientists, but they did not buckle. Eventually, “management” and the CAA allowed flights through low ash areas if a strict maintenance checking schedule was followed.

Post normal “science” would seem to have been created to overcome the problem of scientists saying it as they see it. When they see something inconvenient, it has to be post-normalled out of the way by choosing which part of the uncertainty you are prepared to ignore.

Often this is achieved by characterising the scientist as a stupid, self-interested kill-joy.

WHAT SCINCE IS (please don’t dilute it with PNS)

“As he formulates his final theory, the scientist subjects it to intensive criticism. Seeking to make it as useful as possible, he asks himself: Is this proposed law universal throughout the extent of space and the passage of time? Does it lead anywhere? Does it predict one state of affairs as arising out of another? Can it be transposed from one frame of reference to another and still remain valid? And finally, because of his innate passion for orderliness, his aesthetic appreciation of things which are meet and fitting, he asks: Is this theory as elegant as possible? Could I formulate it more succinctly?

Now comes the moment of verification and truth: testing the theory back against protocol experience to establish its validity. If it is not a trivial theory, it suggests the existence of unknown facts which can be verified by further experiment. An expedition may go to Africa to watch an eclipse and find out if starlight really does end relatively as it passes the edge of the sun. After a Maxwell and his theory of electro-magnetism come a Hertz looking for radio waves and a Marconi building a radio set. If the theoretical predictions do not fit in with observable facts, then the theorist has to forget his disappointment and start all over again. This is the stern discipline which keeps science sound and rigorously honest.

If a theory survives all tests and is accepted into the canon of scientific law, it becomes a fact in its own right and a foundation for higher spires of thought. Abstract though it may be, a theory which has been proved can suggest new hi-fl sets or hybrid cattle just as surely as do experiments with electricity or stock-breeding. It serves as a starting point for new theories just as surely as any experience on the plane of protocols. Galileo’s formula for the increasing speed at which a body falls freely near the surface of the earth became a single example of Newton’s law of gravitation. Newton’s law, in turn, became a single special case in Einstein’s theory that gravitation is a manifestation of the geometry of space and time. At this moment some child in a hamlet somewhere may be preparing himself for the work of constructing a “unified field theory” of both atom and cosmos, in which Einstein’s sweeping concepts of relativity will appear as mere details.”

The Scientist
Life Science Library
By Henry Margenau, David Bergamini
And the Editors of LIFE
1966

“Do you think that lives are at stake? consider a 1.5 meter rise in Bangladesh. You said that its wacko to assert that life expectancy wont be effected. which means you think that that life expectancy will be effected. That is, you think people will die earlier than they would have otherwise. ”
Bangladesh:
“75% of Bangladesh is less than 10m above sea level and 80% is flood plain”
Each year in Bangladesh about 26,000 km sq, (around 18%) of the country is flooded, killing over 5,000 people and destroying 7 million homes. During severe floods the affected area may exceed 75% of the country, as was seen in 1998. ”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floods_in_Bangladesh

So every year in Bangladesh, one gets flooding that kills thousands of people. 100,000 people or more in the past have died from severe flooding. It possible that higher standards of living fewer people could die from flooding in the future. And more recent times because of modest increases in living standards fewer people have probably died from similar levels of flooding.
Compare to Katrina and New Orleans:
“A new study has found that 67 percent of the fatalities in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina hit in August 2005 resulted from direct impacts of the flooding that occurred when the levees collapsed”
“In all, 518 out of the analyzed 771 deaths in New Orleans resulted from direct exposure to the flooding, according to the results of the study “Loss of Life Caused by the Flooding of New Orleans After Hurricane Katrina: Analysis of the Relationship Between Flood Characteristics and Mortality,” which is reported in the May issue of the peer-reviewed journal Risk Analysis, published by the Society for Risk Analysis.”
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/southcentral/2009/05/18/100605.htm

“The 1991 Bangladesh cyclone was among the deadliest tropical cyclones on record. On the night of 29 April 1991 a powerful tropical cyclone struck the Chittagong district of southeastern Bangladesh with winds of around 250 km/h (155 mph). The storm forced a 6 metre (20 ft) storm surge inland over a wide area, killing at least 138,000 people and leaving as many as 10 million homeless.
….
At least 138,000 people were killed by the storm, with the majority of deaths in the Chittagong area. Most deaths were from drowning, with the highest mortality among children and the elderly. Although cyclone shelters had been built after the 1970 Bhola cyclone, many had just a few hours of warning and did not know where to go for shelter. Others who knew about the storm refused to evacuate because they did not believe the storm would be as bad as forecast. Even so it is estimated over 2 million people did evacuate from the most dangerous areas, possibly mitigating the disaster substantially.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991_Bangladesh_cyclone

“The scientists analysed how the two rivers and the land around them changed in response to the changing climate from 1943 to 2008.

They found that the rate of sediment addition was more than the rate of soil erosion during this period — the country gained nearly 1,800 square kilometres of new land”
“”If we can use these sediments in a planned way we can tackle 60 centimetres to one metre sea level rise over next 100 years,” he said.”
http://www.scidev.net/en/news/river-sediment-may-counter-bangladesh-sea-level-rise.html

So large numbers of people die in Bangladesh from yearly flooding and extreme river flooding occurs periodically. Another cause large number of deaths occurs from Hurricanes. The storm surges have large affect upon this low level region [most of country is on a flood plain.
It seems projects which would reduce damage from hurricane storms surges could also include protection from sea level rise.

By taking steps to increase Bangladesh’s economic growth it seems a likely result would be such projects could be afforded. Bangladesh’s economic growth has been 5 to 6 % per year for over a decade. It seems that continue this growth or increasing it should allow this to occur decade a few decades. It also seems quite possible that Bangladesh could raise foreign investment to shortened the time in which this can occur and save many lives and reduction in property damages.
So even if sea level were to rise by 1 1/2 meter by 2100, it’s quite possible that Bangladesh has the ability to take step that would result having less deaths by 2100.

Sorry … “identified” … by mainstream climate science ..

To explain my last point.

Default must be something specific. Thus in can be no action and it could be some specific action, but it cannot be acting without knowing how to act. Therefore the critical observation is that proceeding to consider alternatives is justified rather than just forgetting the whole issue.

‘Should be trivial’. And there it is. Thank you, Pekka.
=============

It is really irritating that PNS attempts to appropriate and take credit for vigorous blogospherical vetting and commentary on serious societal and economic issues utilizing science to justify policy and financial agendas. The term and concept are superfluous and manipulative.

@brian h

PNS ‘R’ US!

But I agree it’s a really stupid term

When the facts are uncertain, how on earth can we seriously claim that “immediate action is required”?

Well, you have to possess an elusive quality called “common sense.”

Deniers are ignorant of science, for the most part, because most of you have no background in the subject. But deadening your God-given common sense is an unnecessary self-inflicted wound.

I suggest you take some time to mediate on the many, many situations in which immediate action is required even as facts about the situation remain uncertain.

You should be able to name a dozen off the top of your head.

Steven Mosher, Rob is saying that to all intents and purposes the damage sustained to an engine would indicate that you would apply a high precautionary principle. Whether and when an engine fails is incidental except when you know you must fly (which is never unless you’re at war).

Rob, given what you say, the attitude of these airline bosses concern me even more. I guess I’m reminded of the tension that was described between the engineers and managers involved in the Space Shuttle solid rocket boosters prior to the Challenger disaster.

Scientists and engineers saying it as they see get it in the neck from one side for not going with the “postnormal” flow, and in the neck from the other side for supposedly being advocates outside their sphere of knowledge.

Why don’t you give us your own first half dozen as examples so that we can get started? And we can compare them with AGW and see if they share common characteristics.

You should be able to name these off the top of your head.

I don’t see the issue with the paper.

The paper is about northern forests and we know the solar forcing in the summer months has reduced gradually over that period.

Turns out the climate in this region has been relatively stable for 2000 years – cooling at 0.31C per 1000 years, which is pretty slow compared with current observed warming (which has obviously more than wiped out this 2000 years of local cooling), and doesn’t seem to give support for any chaotic events having long term consequences.

I guess it sounds like it is suggesting an up-rating of the MWP in other northern hemisphere records. So the science moves on.

I haven’t read what sceptical-science says about it…

…have now – seems I’m saying similar things. Additionally, they are saying that the disagreement in the importance of the MXD data is undermined by the fact that it is not supported by non-tree ring proxies.

Most of the skepticalscience (got the spelling korrect now) argument seems to be targetting the blogosphere (post normal?) reaction to the paper rather than the paper itself. So the following is a pretty outrageous mischaracterisation

Now you may dismiss in the blogosphere the Esper 2012 study as corrupted garbage. As John Cook and other dedicated global warming groupthink gatekeepers are wont to do.

They actually say: “Esper et al. – A Valuable but Overstated Contribution”.

Bart R,
The lack of substantive response on your part is notable.
I would submit that your inability to see that you and the other trolls here are extremists, and that you are simply unwilling to admit that the Greenland story has been deceptively presented.
Since this is a thread about post normal science, my post was topical.
Yours was just an unintended bit of sad humor attempting to distract from the issue of how corrupting post normal science is.
Thanks for the laugh.

The purest form of rubbish I have seen. Utter nonsense. Politics is not science (as in really NOT anything like science). Accepting politics as part of science is corrosive and destructive of advancing technical understanding.

Pokerguy hopes: “One of the things that fills me with a fierce desire to live another ten years, is to see [Hansen and his colleagues] begin to get their just desserts.

Pokerguy, you are to reflect that if in coming years we see acceleration of the rate of sea level rise this decade, then Hansen and his colleagues indeed will receive their just desserts …

… namely, the acclaim and approbation of the entire world.

And given the accelerating ice-melt we are seeing in 2012, that prediction seems likely to be fulfilled, eh?

As Richard Feynman said: “Nature cannot be fooled.”

What other reasonable hopes do you have for the future, Pokerguy?      

steven -

Is t possible that you really don’t understand this?

I am not certain that seas will rise by 1.5 meters in Bangladesh.

Call me wacko if you will, but I am certain that a sea rise of 1.5 meters would cause deaths and impoverishment in places like Bangladesh, unless of course before that rise occurred god were to put his (her?) hand down and lift Bangladesh in elevation, sparing it from deadly and impoverishing outcomes. But then people in other areas of the world would still suffer, wouldn’t they?

gbaikie offers a nice way to look at the issue. He gives evidence of how destructive flooding is in Bangladesh. Of course, it’s obvious that with dramatic economic growth it is possible that fewer people would be affected than otherwise, but would that compensate sufficiently to completely mitigate the damage in a place like that from flooding should seas rise by 1.5 meters? Only a motivated thinker could think so. Estimates are for 18 million people affected and 22,000 km2 of land submerged. Let’s say that error in estimation combined with efficient capitalization of GDP growth and foreign aid reduces that impact, exponentially to 1.8 million people affected and 1,800 km2 of land submerged. An area nearly 1/2 the size of Rhode Island, with the highest population in the world, in a country that depends on the fishing industry, where houses are poorly constructed, where past efforts to build infrastructure have been fraught with problems. Yeah, I’m just wacky.

And gbaikie – imagine what would have happened in NO if the Katrina had occurred with seas 1.5 meters higher.

So even if sea level were to rise by 1 1/2 meter by 2100, it’s quite possible that Bangladesh has the ability to take step that would result having less deaths by 2100.

Yes, it is possible that the severity of the impact might be lessened, assuming continuous dramatic economic growth in Bangladesh, efficient capitalization of that growth by its government, and additional economic aid from other sources (don’t bother asking Rob Starkey for his money). Fewer deaths and less impoverishment would occur than would happen minus the continuous dramatic economic growth, efficient capitalization of that growth and foreign aid by its government. That possibility is not mutually exclusive from the conclusion that a rise of 1.5 meters in sea level would displace and kill people in Bangladesh and other places around the globe that perhaps were not able to capitalize on sustained and constant economic growth and significant aid from other sources.

I see that you must like the logic shown in the excerpt from the Cato report that Judith excerpted.

but every now and then the relationship between the word that I think and the word that I write is of some other nature.

In some of the work I have done with international clients, I read them a short passage and ask them to say it back to me exactly as I read it to them (including reproducing word grouping, pitch, inflection, individual sounds, volume change, etc.). What is fascinating is that sometimes they will repeat mostly everything as I said it, but substitute a synonym for one word or another to what was in the original passage.

When I think about that, it’s amazing. In real time, as they are saying something back to me, they can process information well-enough to parse the meaning of the entire sentence, search through their brain and find a similar word to the original word, that fits appropriately in context (i.e., the right part of speech), and insert it as they are speaking.

Of course, I know you said that the typos exist in Finish also, and although obviously your English is quite good – some of your “typos” I would guess originate with the extra layer of complication added by using a language other than your first. Do you translate when you write in English, or are you at the level where you can actually think in English as you type?