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The Rightful Place of Science: Disasters and Climate Change
In recent years the media, politicians, and activists have popularized the notion that climate change has made disasters worse. But what does the science actually say? Roger Pielke, Jr. takes a close look at the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the underlying scientific research, and the data to give you the latest science on disasters and climate change. What he finds may surprise you and raise questions about the role of science in political debates.
The Rightful Place of Science is a book series published by Arizona State University's Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes, and edited by G. Pascal Zachary. The series explores the complex interactions among science, technology, politics, and the human condition.
126 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 29, 2015
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 17, 2021
The best part of the book is its clarity of thought. It is short (100 pages) and dense, but the writing is engaging and easy to understand. There's an art of *simply stating things clearly* that is rare among academics, and Pielke is great at it.
Two questions plus Pielke's answers form the core of the book:
- Is climate change making disasters (e.g. floods, hurricanes, droughts) more costly? ― No.
- Then why the hell do politicians and activists so often act as if it was? ― Yes.
...all right, the answer to the second question is a bit complicated. This is Pielke's topic of expertise: he's known both for his work on climate change itself and on understanding the intersection of science and politics. Most of the book is spent discussing the first question (i.e., the actual data on natural disasters), but he also spends two chapters discussing the second.
I.
Damages from natural catastrophes are rising steadily, as they have been for many decades now, all around the world. This is because we're building more stuff that can be destroyed by disasters: populations and economies are growing, and alongside them grow disaster losses. To check whether climate change is contributing to the rise in these losses, there are two approaches:
a) Attempt to normalize the data on economic losses to adjust for the fact that we've built more.
b) Look at the climate data (e.g hurricane frequency and strength) directly.
Both of these investigations have been done, and the majority of scientists agree that there's very likely no relationship between climate change and disaster losses. Pielke's conclusion is that there are many reasons to combat climate change, but economic losses from disasters is not one of them (and probably won't be for at least a few decades).
Most of the book consist in explaining the methods used to study trends in climate, natural catastrophes, and economic losses resulting from catastrophes.
II.
Until a short time ago (2000), all this was fairly uncontroversial. Sometime in the 00s it crossed, within the media consciousness, from "boring climate science fact" to "borderline climate change denial". Pielke (who in the early 2000s was briefing senators on climate science) describes being urged to lie about the results of his research:
In the following years, Pielke is regularly attacked for his views, including a campaign to brand him a "climate change denialist" that ultimately gets him fired from a position as writer for 538.
What strikes me most is the stark contrast between the behavior of the scientific community and the science policy community. Journalists write scathing articles branding him a denialist, Congress orders him investigated for receiving funding for Exxon Mobile on a hunch (which of course he didn't), and a prestigious "nonpartisan" DC think tank brags about getting him fired from 538.
Meanwhile, Pielke's scientist colleagues defend him and broadly agree with his conclusions; his university, pressured to investigate Pielke, passes a motion to support academic freedom, and the the IPCC special reports state clearly that there's no good reason to think disasters are getting worse because of climate change.
Pielke concludes on an optimistic note: sure, the political discourse on climate change is terrible. But, whatever most climate activists believe,
Two questions plus Pielke's answers form the core of the book:
- Is climate change making disasters (e.g. floods, hurricanes, droughts) more costly? ― No.
- Then why the hell do politicians and activists so often act as if it was? ― Yes.
...all right, the answer to the second question is a bit complicated. This is Pielke's topic of expertise: he's known both for his work on climate change itself and on understanding the intersection of science and politics. Most of the book is spent discussing the first question (i.e., the actual data on natural disasters), but he also spends two chapters discussing the second.
I.
Damages from natural catastrophes are rising steadily, as they have been for many decades now, all around the world. This is because we're building more stuff that can be destroyed by disasters: populations and economies are growing, and alongside them grow disaster losses. To check whether climate change is contributing to the rise in these losses, there are two approaches:
a) Attempt to normalize the data on economic losses to adjust for the fact that we've built more.
b) Look at the climate data (e.g hurricane frequency and strength) directly.
Both of these investigations have been done, and the majority of scientists agree that there's very likely no relationship between climate change and disaster losses. Pielke's conclusion is that there are many reasons to combat climate change, but economic losses from disasters is not one of them (and probably won't be for at least a few decades).
Most of the book consist in explaining the methods used to study trends in climate, natural catastrophes, and economic losses resulting from catastrophes.
II.
Until a short time ago (2000), all this was fairly uncontroversial. Sometime in the 00s it crossed, within the media consciousness, from "boring climate science fact" to "borderline climate change denial". Pielke (who in the early 2000s was briefing senators on climate science) describes being urged to lie about the results of his research:
My surprise was that my colleagues were asking me to downplay and to even misrepresent my own research because it was viewed as being inconvenient to what these scientists saw as the appropriate approach to advocacy on climate policy [...].
In the following years, Pielke is regularly attacked for his views, including a campaign to brand him a "climate change denialist" that ultimately gets him fired from a position as writer for 538.
What strikes me most is the stark contrast between the behavior of the scientific community and the science policy community. Journalists write scathing articles branding him a denialist, Congress orders him investigated for receiving funding for Exxon Mobile on a hunch (which of course he didn't), and a prestigious "nonpartisan" DC think tank brags about getting him fired from 538.
Meanwhile, Pielke's scientist colleagues defend him and broadly agree with his conclusions; his university, pressured to investigate Pielke, passes a motion to support academic freedom, and the the IPCC special reports state clearly that there's no good reason to think disasters are getting worse because of climate change.
Pielke concludes on an optimistic note: sure, the political discourse on climate change is terrible. But, whatever most climate activists believe,
[...] the battle over public opinion on climate change has long been over―it has been won, decisively in fact, by those favouring action.
October 20, 2020
Great take backed up by IPCC data on the recent history of natural disaster losses.
February 9, 2015
The Rightful Place of Science: Disasters and Climate Change (2014) by Roger Pielke Jnr provides an excellent overview of the scientific consensus on extreme weather events and climate change. It also provides an interesting examination of what happens when you put forward the majority view in an area where the science is contested.
Pielke Jnr is an expert on the use of science in politics and on disasters and climate change. He's been involved with the IPCC in a number of their reports. He also says something that many climate activists do not want to hear, which is the IPCC view that extreme weather costs have not increased due to climate change. Costs have gone up due to more people living by coastlines and increasing value of housing, but as, the IPCC Special Report on Extreme Weather states:
Long-term trends in economic disaster losses adjusted for wealth and population increases have not been attributed to climate change, but a role for climate has not been excluded.
While climate change may, in future, lead to a signal in extreme weather events at this point according to the consensus it has not. This point is something that is made in more detail in the book.
Pielke Jnr goes into detail about how writing about this point led to political pressure being applied to stop him writing for the statistically inclined 538 website. He also says how climate scientists have told him not to make this point because it isn't helpful even if it is true.
The book also extends into points about the Kaya Identity and the failure of 20 years of climate activism to reduce C02 emissions. He describes the immense challenge of decarbonizing the economy and the requirement that to meet targets for 2050 the world would require one nuclear power station per day or equivalent. The points made in this section are those made by the Breakthrough Institute.
It's an excellent, short, crisp book on climate change that describes the consensus science and provides extensive examples of what is said on this aspect of climate change.
Pielke Jnr is an expert on the use of science in politics and on disasters and climate change. He's been involved with the IPCC in a number of their reports. He also says something that many climate activists do not want to hear, which is the IPCC view that extreme weather costs have not increased due to climate change. Costs have gone up due to more people living by coastlines and increasing value of housing, but as, the IPCC Special Report on Extreme Weather states:
Long-term trends in economic disaster losses adjusted for wealth and population increases have not been attributed to climate change, but a role for climate has not been excluded.
While climate change may, in future, lead to a signal in extreme weather events at this point according to the consensus it has not. This point is something that is made in more detail in the book.
Pielke Jnr goes into detail about how writing about this point led to political pressure being applied to stop him writing for the statistically inclined 538 website. He also says how climate scientists have told him not to make this point because it isn't helpful even if it is true.
The book also extends into points about the Kaya Identity and the failure of 20 years of climate activism to reduce C02 emissions. He describes the immense challenge of decarbonizing the economy and the requirement that to meet targets for 2050 the world would require one nuclear power station per day or equivalent. The points made in this section are those made by the Breakthrough Institute.
It's an excellent, short, crisp book on climate change that describes the consensus science and provides extensive examples of what is said on this aspect of climate change.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews