Experts in climate change are not obviously biased
...square with this?
there are strong incentives to toe the official line
Doesn't that equate to bias, at least in practical terms?
They do not profit directly from the outcome of their recommendations
They most certainly do. Recommendations that there is a big problem that needs lots of analysis lead to secure jobs and political power for the scientists doing the analysis. Recommendations that "there is nothing to see here, move along" don't.
they are in principle paid by the government to be objective.
Perhaps they are, in principle, though I would argue that that isn't really true. You can't combine scientific objectivity with a political agenda, but that's exactly what government funding of science does.
academia also has the ability to be self correcting
This is certainly possible, but it's not easy, and the mechanism by which it happens is thwarted by claims of "consensus" or that "the science is settled".
I've never heard any argument that global warming might be good.
You have spewn out a lot of garbage above, and I'm not going to bother replying to all your points. The once point that was valid was
>They most certainly do. Recommendations that there is a big problem that needs lots of analysis lead to secure jobs and political power for the scientists doing the analysis. Recommendations that "there is nothing to see here, move along" don't.
This is indeed a significant bias. First, there is also an incentive for disagreeing with the mainstream since people with other political views or agendas are willing to fund it as well. I can't remember the name (google might be your friend here) but there was a group of skeptics who reanalyzed temperature data so as to better account for heat islands. They ended up confirming global warming. Second, while as a group researchers benefit from belief in global warming, an individual researcher could do very well from finding convincing evidence against global warming.
These are all reasons why in spite of this bias the conclusions of mainstream researchers are probably valid.
there is also an incentive for disagreeing with the mainstream since people with other political views or agendas are willing to fund it as well
This might be an incentive for scientists to serve other political agendas, yes. (Though it's not much of an incentive unless those other agendas have a realistic chance at political power.) But it's not an incentive for scientists to be more objective; it's only an incentive for them to be biased in a different direction.
while as a group researchers benefit from belief in global warming, an individual researcher could do very well from finding convincing evidence against global warming
I'm not sure they could; at any rate, I think it's a matter of opinion, and opinions are going to vary widely.
These are all reasons why in spite of this bias the conclusions of mainstream researchers are probably valid
No, they're not. None of these reasons have anything to do with whether the mainstream conclusions are valid. That was my original point in this subthread: to know whether or not the conclusions are valid, you have to actually look at the data and the arguments based on the data. Trying to figure it out by looking at who is biased how doesn't count.
Also, there's a bait and switch here regarding what "mainstream conclusions" we are supposed to accept. Are we supposed to accept that (1) the climate is changing? Are we supposed to accept that (2) the direction in which it is currently changing is a warming direction? Both of those claims strike me as fairly obvious.
Are we supposed to accept that (3) the IPCC's predictions of what the climate will be like in 2100 are reasonable? I don't think anybody knows enough about how the climate works to say that.
Or are we supposed to accept that (4) we have a planetary emergency and if we don't take drastic action now to keep the climate from changing, we are all doomed? I think that's wrong, and worse, it's dangerous, because acting on this recommendation will squander huge amounts of resources that could be better spent on (a) bringing more people out of poverty, and (b) making it easier for the entire world to adapt to change (climate or otherwise).
Much of the furor over climate change is people talking past each other: people who hold opinions like the ones I've just expressed on #3 and #4 are accused of denying #1 and #2, while people who are only trying to argue for #1 and #2 are accused of arguing for #3 or #4. That makes it almost impossible to have a discussion in which #1 and #2 are reasonably common ground, while #3 and #4, which are the claims that are important if you're trying to decide what to do, can be rationally disputed.
Experts in climate change are not obviously biased
...square with this?
there are strong incentives to toe the official line
Doesn't that equate to bias, at least in practical terms?
They do not profit directly from the outcome of their recommendations
They most certainly do. Recommendations that there is a big problem that needs lots of analysis lead to secure jobs and political power for the scientists doing the analysis. Recommendations that "there is nothing to see here, move along" don't.
they are in principle paid by the government to be objective.
Perhaps they are, in principle, though I would argue that that isn't really true. You can't combine scientific objectivity with a political agenda, but that's exactly what government funding of science does.
academia also has the ability to be self correcting
This is certainly possible, but it's not easy, and the mechanism by which it happens is thwarted by claims of "consensus" or that "the science is settled".
I've never heard any argument that global warming might be good.
Google is your friend:
https://www.google.com/search?q=benefits+of+global+warming
China and India both recognize the importance of CO2 emissions.
No, they recognize that CO2 emissions give them a political lever to use, and they are using it, exactly as you describe:
They claim that any global cap-and-trade system should be based on per-capita quotas.
In other words, they want to make sure that cap and trade, if it happens, does more economic damage to us than it does to them.