@Porphyry - First off, I re-read my post to you and realize it may come off as a bit heated - wasn't intended that way so i apologize for any offense. In the desire to keep things transparent... I will say that ethics issues with research was not the ONLY reason I left active science research. Money was another one and truth be told the larger one. I hit an earnings ceiling with my current level of education, had a young family to care for, and simply no longer had the time and energy I once had to advance my education level and still live a enjoyable life outside of that. Really, the ethics issues took a back seat to life in general.

As for science being a dirty business... yes and no. It really depends on what science you are doing. Geotechnical work directly relating back to oil company profits... super dirty. Pure high energy physics that may or may not have applications in other areas is, while not pristine, a helluva lot cleaner on the ethics front. The LHC, if you look at it's history and how it came into being, did indeed get built upon "maybe finding the Higgs boson, or something" . It has no directly useful purpose beyond the pure science it can return. It may possibly lead to something useful outside of knowledge for the sake of knowledge but the funding requests made it clear that this is a low likelyhood and a secondary concern at best. It has no economic goal, no return on investment for the countries involved, other than prestige and contributing to the human understanding of our universe. It is the most ethically pure science we are likely to see in our lifetimes, unfortunately. Astronomy is another area where the ethics of science tend to be much clearer that say, pharmaceutical research. And that's unfortunate. Some of the areas of scientific research that could produce the greatest improvements in the human condition are tainted by capitalism. (Note, I'm not anti capitalist - far from it) this is why it is important for governments to fund "pure" science. Funding that does not have economic gain as a goal for the funding party is what the world needs more of. Much more.

I might also point out that climate science, up until recently, was funded by and large by non-profit seeking entities. Like the US govt. A group I might add that stands to lose much more in the short term because of the results of the research they funded than they will gain. lately you see more and more climate research being done by energy companies (Ethics Alert!) - both companies that want things to stay as they are and companies that stand to benefit form a major change. so you see wildly conflicting reports. Luckily for us there is a mechanism for filtering this stuff - funding is disclosed in research papers. I think you know as well as I do that scientists partly include this info as a weighting measure for the research itself. I certainly know I did. I think you;d also agree that when talking to fellow researchers you are much more likely to be honest about your data than when talking to the people paying your salary who want a specific answer. I always found conversation amongst fellows - who well understand the pressures involved in the work - to be quite open and honest about the shortcomings of a particular paper or other. Climate.org seems to me to be the climate science community talking in this mode.

So... I'm ranting. Sorry. Back on topic a bit. While there is definitely less than ethical data out there on climate change it also doesn't take much to sort the wheat from the chaff as it were. The wheat paints a decidedly bleak picture if we don't do something. As for Crichtons' message about half measures... yes, they will NOT be enough. They are a start though. Half measures will slow things down - even if only a tiny bit - and every bit of time we can get gives us more of chance to do something effective. Doing nothing at all is a guarantee for failure. Failure here is VERY bad. So by all means, do the half measures! Get folks to change out lightbulbs and drive hybrids. It preps their mindset for the bigger changes that will eventually need to occur.

Ahem. I seem to have rambled. Sorry. Day off, no coffee, diminished focus!

I hope those of the "she'll be right" persuation realise the've alligned themselves with emminent person Dr Jeremy Clarkson...

If I was a god I think Dan would be a fantastic Top Gear: Star in a reasonably priced car.

Mop haired nerd guru vs the tall fat one.
The vitriol would be *ahem* epic.

Hope you can drive Dan ;-)

But I found this from Obama to be heartening:

The debates unnerved both candidates. When he was preparing for them during the Democratic primaries, Obama was recorded saying, “I don’t consider this to be a good format for me, which makes me more cautious. I often find myself trapped by the questions and thinking to myself, ‘You know, this is a stupid question, but let me … answer it.’ So when Brian Williams is asking me about what’s a personal thing that you’ve done [that’s green], and I say, you know, ‘Well, I planted a bunch of trees.’ And he says, ‘I’m talking about personal.’ What I’m thinking in my head is, ‘Well, the truth is, Brian, we can’t solve global warming because I f—ing changed light bulbs in my house. It’s because of something collective‘.”
(http://climateprogress.org/2008/11/06/obama-brian-we-cant-solve-global-warming-because-i-f-ing-changed-light-bulbs-in-my-house/ - http://www.newsweek.com/id/167581/page/2 - shame the rest of the article is mostly mush.)

That's light years ahead of the attitude of the last administration, no matter which side of the fence you're on.

OA

But seriously, your comments about science are dead-on. The biggest problem is that it’s conducted by humans with all their frailties. Putting dinner on the table or putting your kids through University will almost always trump professional ethics (at least in cases where it won’t get you fired or put in jail). The ones we have to watch out for aren’t the little guys that are just trying to do right by themselves and their families. It’s the big guys that understand this and know how to manipulate it to their personal and professional advantage. One should always maintain a healthy skepticism toward them and their message. As someone working for a big multinational company (presumably that’s what “big oil” means), I’m guessing you’ve seen your share of creatures of this sort.

OA

We're on the same wavelength - I can see you know exactly what I was talking about and you've seen that science is a dirty, dirty business. My little point was that while we squint at dodgied-up graphs the arguments about consensus and about whether one group of scientists is a bigger bunch of shills than another is all a bit (pun intended) academic to me. Tenure or not you still have to get funding for research from somewhere and the people with the money ain't giving it to you for nothing. I very much doubt the LHC was built on the vague intention of "maybe finding the Higgs boson, or something".

The fact you dropped out of science on ethical grounds reminds me of my cousin who spent years in art school, won heaps of national prizes but never became an artist because he couldn't handle the thought of "selling out his art". Instead he became an administrator at a government office. I'm still in science because I'm curious about science-y stuff and this is the best way to get my fix (yes, I know Einstein was a Patent officer but c'mon). I'm still doing science, he's not doing art: who's sold out more? The fact that scientists need to promise results to schlubs that don't understand our work to secure funding is an unpleasant but necessary part of the job - much like selling paintings to schlubs who don't get art.

So again were we bad scientists? Well, I'd like to think I'm pretty good at the *business* of science, OK at experimenting and maybe lousy at the modelling theory.

OK. And lousy at the ethics. Always with the ethics :)

btw If anyone's keeping count I do think anthropogenic climate change is happening. You know, just in case we want to put out some kind of consensus statement on behalf of the forum...

What he actually said - in that debate, anyway - was that he didn't see any good reason to believe that the human race's CO2 emissions have a substantial effect on climate change, and that he saw less warming predicted by each new climate model. Thus, he said, the normal progression of technology to solutions that're superior to burning oil seemed likely to be sufficient to deal with the problem, without declaring a "crisis" to exist. We'll just muddle on through, there's no need to get all excited about it; let's direct our attention to helping the poor before making Hundred Year Plans to address climate change.

I don't think he was anywhere near correct in his conclusions, for several reasons. One of them is that coal is most emphatically not going to run out in the next few decades, and it looks likely to be cost-effective for the burgeoning third-world energy market for a disturbingly long time to come. Another is that I don't actually see any climate-change plans that start out with "Bugger the Third World; let's bomb 'em so we don't have to watch 'em starve."

I agree, however, that every measure that has been taken seriously by the world's major countries is unlikely to make much of a dent in the problem. Look at all the hoopla over the Kyoto Protocol; Kyoto commits nations to doing very close to nothing at all, but the USA still hasn't ratified it.

Where my thinking diverges from Crichton's is that I think a case can be made that this lack of action is going to result in wars, famines, plagues and associated economic disruption on an epic scale, in every part of the world where an increase in the cost of living of five bucks a day means you don't get to live any more.