Christmas gift ideas: Thinking of our grandchildren

Books are ideal Christmas presents. And as I am spending some time dealing with family business I thought reposting some of my past book reviews over the next few days could be useful am repeating some of my past book reviews.

Climate change is a pressing issue – and one which attracts a lot of politically inspired misinformation. Hansen’s book provides a lot of the science, but also the history of the science..

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Book Review: Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity by James Hansen

Price: US$16.50*
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA (December 8, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1608192008
ISBN-13: 978-1608192007

Climate change contrarians and deniers love to hate James Hansen. He’s up there alongside Al Gore, Michael Mann and Phil Jones. And of course their hatred is no more justified in Hansen’s case than it is for the others.

Others criticise Hansen for his “activism.” His willingness to warn politicians and the population in general of the dangers we face if we continue with a “business as usual” approach to fossil fuel and CO₂ emissions. They suggest this could discredit his science. Scientists must always be objective and should limit their pronouncements to the scientific facts alone.

This is not an old problem for scientists – remember their activism after the first use of nuclear weapons and the beginning of the nuclear arms race. Scientists often confront ethical issues arising out of their work.

This is scary!

Well it must be for citizens of Louisiana and the surrounding US states on the Gulf of Mexico.

There are nearly 4,000 active oil and gas platforms in the area! Obviously an accident just waiting to happen. Well actually we might expect several accidents.

As PZ Myer points out (A constructive suggestion for retribution against BP):

Everyone is fixated on that one burning mess in the Gulf, which is probably exactly what the oil companies want — they are probably sweating pungent carcinogenic petrochemicals at the thought that someone might look around and notice all of those other rigs, which almost certainly have a paper trail of shortcuts and risks and shoddy management.

He is suggesting that the US administration should be also paying attention  to these other platforms.

That image puts it into perspective for me. We have a real problem with fossil fuels and it’s not just CO₂ emissions.

Image credit NOOA.
See also: Nigeria’s agony dwarfs the Gulf oil spill . The US and Europe ignore it

Climate change and the integrity of science

Here is the lead letter published in today’s issue of Science magazine. It’s signed by 255 members of the US National Academy of Sciences

CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE INTEGRITY OF SCIENCE

We are deeply disturbed by the recent escalation of political assaults on scientists in general and on climate scientists in particular. All citizens should understand some basic scientific facts. There is always some uncertainty associated with scientific conclusions; science never absolutely proves anything. When someone says that society should wait until scientists are absolutely certain before taking any action, it is the same as saying society should never take action. For a problem as potentially catastrophic as climate change, taking no action poses a dangerous risk for our planet.

Thinking of our grandchildren

Book Review: Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity by James Hansen

Price: US$16.50*
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA (December 8, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1608192008
ISBN-13: 978-1608192007

Climate change contrarians and deniers love to hate James Hansen. He’s up there alongside Al Gore, Michael Mann and Phil Jones. And of course their hatred is no more justified in Hansen’s case than it is for the others.

Others criticise Hansen for his “activism.” His willingness to warn politicians and the population in general of the dangers we face if we continue with a “business as usual” approach to fossil fuel and CO₂ emissions. They suggest this could discredit his science. Scientists must always be objective and should limit their pronouncements to the scientific facts alone.

This is not an old problem for scientists – remember their activism after the first use of nuclear weapons and the beginning of the nuclear arms race. Scientists often confront ethical issues arising out of their work.

The climate change denial industry

Book review: The climate denial industry and climate science – a brief history of attacks on climate science, climate scientists and the IPCC by Cindy Baxter
Publisher: Greenpeace International (24 March, 2010)
Number of pages: 25
Publishers description: This report describes 20 years of organised attacks on climate science, scientists and the IPCC. It sets out some of the key moments in this campaign of denial started by the fossil fuel industry, and traces them to their sources.
Download Document

Anyone interested in the current “climategate” clamour will find the report interesting. It’s a must read. It’s brief (25 pages) and available as a free pdf download.

Dealing in Doubt has just been released by Greenpeace international. The report provides a brief history of attacks on climate science, climate scientists and the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It starts with the 1990s, describing the prehistory of the organisations involved (campaigning against the science on the dangers of tobacco) and the formation of the denial networks. And the history is described up until the last few weeks.

Even little old New Zealand gets a mention:

“The campaign has made it to New Zealand, where the Business Roundtable has regularly hosted a slew of denial tours, from Fred Singer in the early ‘90’s to Lord Lawson as recently as 2007134. The New Zealand government’s international stance on climate change is one of the weakest in the industrialised world.

The New Zealand and Australian deniers have joined forces with Canadian deniers to form the International Climate Science Coalition. The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition, formed in 2006, has given international fame to a small group of retired colonels and scientists, who managed to get the Heartland Institute to pay for them to attend conferences, and were supported, in part, by Heartland to go to the Bali climate negotiations in 2008.”

It’s heavily referenced for any reader who wants to dig deeper. The resources listed include useful blogs and some excellent books.

There are lots of details in this report but it still only skims over the surface of the climate denjial networks and their funding. I would love someone to dig deeper into the New Zealand situation. To reveal the links between the ACT Party, The Climate Science Coalition, the Climate Conversation Group , and the Centre for Political Research. These organisations certainly coordinated their activity recently in attacking New Zealand NIWA scientists. They will also be  linked to the usual overseas conservative organisations like The Heartland Insitute and conservative media like The American Thinker, and Quadrant.

But this report is a great start.

See also:
Dealing in doubt: 20 years of attacks on climate science
Greenpeace Says Climate Denialism a 20–Year Industry
Crescendo to Climategate Cacophony

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Environmental movement needs pragmatism

Book Review: Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto by Stewart Brand

Price: US$17.153
Hardcover: 336 page
Publisher: Viking Adult (October 15, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0670021210
ISBN-13: 978-0670021215

Stewart Brand is an invigorating and challenging writer. He has a long history in the environmental movement. His green credentials are undeniable. But he is not afraid to think outside the box. To challenge current environmental thinking. And to fight against the destructive role of ideology which can be such a limitation in political movements.

This book has two clear messages for environmentalists and “greens”:

1: Discard ideology.

2: Cities are green, nuclear energy is green, genetic engineering is green.

Brand proposes a pragmatic, non-ideological approach to the ecological and environmental problems we face today. In the process he has to critique some ideas he formerly promoted, and some of his allies still promote.

The book effectively deals with four areas. The role of cities, shanty towns and slums, the problem of anthropological contributions to climate change, the problem of energy and the role of nuclear power, and the resistance to solutions using genetic engineering.

Those “climategate” emails

The current “scandal” erupting around the hacking of servers at the University of East Anglias’ Climate Research Centre is rather predictable. The public release of stolen emails has been seized on by climate change deniers as evidence for their claims of manipulated data and faulty peer-review. Even more dishonestly they have been used to attack the integrity of science, and scientists, in general – quite apart form any climate change issue (see for example WarmingGate, The scientific community and self-criticism, Climate scientists caught lying and How the Global Warming Scientists Really Work at four local religious apologetics blogs). On the other hand, researchers and many newspaper commentators say the emails show nothing more than frank discussion between scientists around the world and details of their collaboration on research projects and journal articles.

Life: a gene-centric view

It’s hard to imagine two scientists more qualified to discuss this topic than Richard Dawkins and Craig Venter.

Richard Dawkins FRS is the Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford. He has written extensively about evolutionary biology and is a great populariser of science. His book The Selfish Gene(1976, 1989), was described by Craig Venter as perhaps the most important scientific book of the 20th century. In 2006, he established The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science (RDFRS), which is now a registered charity in both the UK and USA. A website, www.RichardDawkins.net, acts as a forum for the exchange of reason, science and critical thinking.

J. Craig Venter is the Founder, Chairman, and President of the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), J. Craig Venter, PhD is regarded as one of the leading scientists of the 21st century for his contributions to genomic research. He was one of the main players in the successful sequencing of the human genome. His institute recently announced the first successful synthesis of a bacterial genome. This is the second step in a three step process of creating a synthetic organism.

These two scientists came together on stage at the Digital Life design (DLD) Conference in Munich, Germnany, last month to discuss a gene-centric view of life. Discussion also included ethical questions raised by recent advances in synthetic biology, the dangers of climate change and how synthetic biology could enable replacement of fossil fuels.

The discussion was exhilarating, although I found a difference of opinion between them on the possibility of horizontal gene transfer in mammals frustrating. This wasn’t resolved in this discussion but hopefully will be clarified in future.

The 61 minute video Life: a gene-centric view is well worth watching. There is also a shorter video (5 min) of highlights from the discussion.

See also
Venter Institute Scientists Create First Synthetic Bacterial Genome

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