Jose L. Duarte
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Media Tips
  • Research
  • Data
  • An example
  • Haiku
  • About

Hurricanes as imagined, construed, and filtered

9/3/2015

8 Comments

 
Klotzbach and Landsea have published an interesting new paper in Journal of Climate on the frequency and percentage of Category 4-5 hurricanes.

Title: Extremely Intense Hurricanes: Revisiting Webster et al. (2005) After 10 Years

Abstract:

Webster et al. (2005) documented a large and significant increase in both the number as well as the percentage of Category 4-5 hurricanes for all global basins from 1970-2004, and this manuscript examines if those trends have continued when including ten additional years of data. In contrast to that study, as shown here, the global frequency of Category 4-5 hurricanes has shown a small, insignificant downward trend while the percentage of Category 4-5 hurricanes has shown a small, insignificant upward trend between 1990 and 2014. Accumulated Cyclone Energy globally has experienced a large and significant downward trend during the same period. We conclude that the primary reason for the increase in Category 4-5 hurricanes noted in observational datasets from 1970 to 2004 by Webster et al. was due to observational improvements at the various global tropical cyclone warning centers, primarily in the first two decades of that study.


So, not much of a trend, though I think 2015 stats might change the results.

What's most interesting to me is that you won't read about this study in the media. Well, you probably won't.

I think we can say with near certainty that Scientific American will not report this. Justin Gillis at the New York Times will not report it. Chris Mooney will not report it. Ars Technica will not report it. Probably none of the major news outlets will report it other than perhaps Fox News. But they will report anything to do with more hurricanes, and anyone linking it to AGW.

Well, we're ruining the test by calling them out. One of these outfits might actually report it as a result of being called out, but I doubt it. 

Something I've been thinking about lately is how mediated and constructed our realities are. We've done a lot of work on this in terms of how a person frames events, for example in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. We know how powerful a person's perspective and framing can be. That alone has implications for how we deal with extremely subtle statistical realities like climate change. (Well, one can see them as subtle – or not. That's the point.)

But in this case I'm talking about exogenous factors – the information that is made available to people. There are a number of quality studies by noted climate scientists and oceanographers that would appear to dampen worries about climate change, or at least catastrophic climate change. However, these papers appear to be virtually ignored by the media. That is interesting.

There's a swath of reality that is being blacked out by major media outlets, and another swath that is being amplified and emotionalized. I think this is clear, and ideally wouldn't  be controversial across the political spectrum. What concerns me is that we may not be dealing with a purely political spectrum at this point. There are many reasons for a social scientist to wonder if environmentalism operates as a religion at both psychological and sociocultural levels of analysis. This question deserves a lot of research. So far, little of it has been conducted, likely due to the current popularity of environmentalism in academic culture, including social science. I think it's clear with specific individuals that environmentalism is their religion (see the Pachauri quote below) – the question is how common this is. Environmentalists are unlikely to be homogeneous.

Perceived reality is such a malleable thing. Lots of people know this, and lots of people use this fact. The whole profession of PR and publicists feeds on it, and it deeply disturbs me to see publicists employed in scientific bodies like AAAS. PR and science are not compatible.

Right now we seem to have a shortage of science writers in general, and an acute shortage of science writers who cover climate and are not also staunch environmentalists. That's an ethical oversight by their employers. If anything is "unsustainable", getting our science through such a biased filter must be. I don't have solutions yet, but this issue should be thoroughly researched. If environmentalism is in fact a religion, this becomes an even bigger problem. We must avoid getting our science from and through a religion, at all costs.



Afterword

For those of you who are environmentalists, well first, welcome. I assume the idea that environmentalism could be a religion might strike you as absurd. Well, some of you may be fine with viewing it as a religion, but I expect most would not be fine with it, for a number of reasons. I haven't given you any details on what I'm thinking about, what my hypotheses might be, how we could navigate this issue and determine, scientifically, if environmentalism is a religion (or similar to one, or something else.) I don't blame you for being offended. It will be some time before we have sizable data on this question, and we need more researchers involved.

IPCC head Rajendra Pachauri was quite explicit about his religious motivations in his resignation letter:

For me the protection of Planet Earth, the survival of all species and sustainability of our ecosystems is more than a mission. It is my religion and my dharma.

I also see a lot of viciousness and cultism in the movement that I don't see as much on other political issues. Greenpeace actually published the following on their website:

The proper channels have failed. It's time for mass civil disobedience to cut off the financial oxygen from denial and scepticism. If you're one of those who believe that this is not just necessary but also possible, speak to us. Let's talk about what that mass civil disobedience is going to look like. If you're one of those who have spent their lives undermining progressive climate legislation, bankrolling junk science, fuelling spurious debates around false solutions and cattle-prodding democratically-elected governments into submission, then hear this: We know who you are. We know where you live. We know where you work. And we be many, but you be few.

This is clearly a threat. Greenpeace's explanation for the post suggests that they don't disown violence and threats:

We realise it might have sounded threatening to some. This is why we have explained over and over that it is NOT a threat of violence, that Greenpeace doesn't endorse violence, it is not a campaign tactic and never will be. 
Juliette


It might have sounded threatening to some? They've explained over and over that it's not a threat? Talk about treating reality as malleable. They don't understand that they don't get to change the reality that it was a threat simply by decree. The man said "We know where you live." I don't think I knew before now that Greenpeace is a wink-wink pro-violence organization. It's deeply worrisome that some of the "science" writers that filter climate science for us happily associate with Greenpeace. (I'd be interested to know if there have been any acts of violence reported against individuals who publicly opposed environmentalism. There was some violence or at least vandalism in California against people who had donated to the anti-gay-marriage proposition. The donation records were public, with addresses apparently. I suppose the gay marriage issue might be another case of very strong emotions and not much formal argumentation or play of ideas.)

I don't think we see this kind of behavior so much on the income tax debate, ObamaCare, drugs, etc. People aren't motivated to threaten others so much for being pro-tax-cut. There seem to be sacred values at work – perhaps religious ones – when people do what Greenpeace did. There are specific concepts of nature and sustainability that environmentalists subscribe to, and perhaps ecological stasis could be said to be a sacred value, since cost-benefit analyses on climate mitigation/adaptation are so controversial to them. There is an intolerance for disagreement that we see when people form tribes that insulate themselves from the views and motivations of out-groups. For example, I think it would be very difficult for staunch environmentalists to understand why someone might admire the Koch brothers for their achievements and agree with their funding choices – their language around the Koch brothers suggests that they think it's self-evident that disagreeing with environmentalism is evil. I don't think they contemplate that people might value and admire productiveness, entrepreneurship, enterprise and so forth in much the same way that environmentalists might value a small carbon footprint.

One thing that's clear is that environmentalism offers signaling opportunities like nothing we've ever seen. Christians and Muslims have never been able to chronically signal their virtue or status as believers by buying a certain kind of car. There's never been a Christian Prius. Or Christian detergent and paper towels and shopping bags. Chronic signaling of one's virtue does not define religion, but that should give you something to think about. There are some distinctive features here.


(Updated main body of post on October 27, 2015: Cut the tangents about trigger warnings, which didn't fit, and cut grumpy parts about academia, which were needless distractions (and too grumpy.))
8 Comments
Steve Reynolds
9/3/2015 04:32:48 pm

Juliette: "...it is NOT a threat of violence, that Greenpeace doesn't endorse violence..."
Of course, while Juliette may sincerely mean that, she may be thinking that public shaming, doxxing, getting people fired, and similar are just fine and not violent threats.

Reply
Barry Woods
9/4/2015 02:36:57 am

Leo Hickman (Guardian) observed that the 'we know where you live' guy was a bit flakey.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2010/apr/06/greenpeace-gene-hashmi-climate-sceptics

This isn't that surprising as "Gene from Greenpeace India" turns out to be Gene Hashmi, the communications director at Greenpeace India. A visit to his Twitter page reveals that he is someone who likes to play it fast and loose with his phrasings – not always an admirable trait for a communications director.

For example, here's a tweet he posted on 9 March after a period of inactivity on his Twitter account:


"I haven't said anything in 7 months, so why are all 32 of you mofos following me? Just so you know, I'm carrying a knife. " - Gene
--------------------------------------


Which makes it a little disappointing that Greenpeace suggested on twitter in response to Jose/Theresphysics conversation, to buy a gun.

(no doubt UK Greenpeace staffer just thought that funny, but in other parts of the world, might be interpreted differently, more juvenile amateur Greenpeace communications)

https://twitter.com/GPUKNews/status/639396799694929920

Joe Duarte ‏@ValidScience · Sep 2
@Foxgoose @BarryJWoods The physics guy is a failed human. He lacks honor and other manly virtues.

There's Physics ‏@theresphysics · Sep 3
@ValidScience Oh no, I lack honor and other manly virtues. Horror of horrors, what am I to do? \swoons @Foxgoose @BarryJWoods

Greenpeace Newsroom Sep 3
‏@GPUKNews @theresphysics Buy a gun. It's the next best thing.

Reply
michael hart
9/4/2015 09:56:09 am

Roger Pielke Jr used to publish on such matters, until recently.
He explicitly stated that the reason he was stopping because of the harassment.

Even being a believer in serious warming did not save him when he went off-message by calling out exaggerations when he found them, or criticising some of the 'grand solutions'.

Reply
David Shipley
9/4/2015 10:19:52 am

Congratulations on all your high quality detective work. I am retired from the reinsurance business and we always felt Landsea was the most reliable hurricane analyst - it seems that for so many people their assessment of scientists such as Landsea or Curry (or indeed "scientists" like Cook and Lewandowsky) is based on the extent to which their writings support the so-called consensus, rather than the actual quality of their work.

Reply
Salamano
9/5/2015 05:33:11 pm

You said:

"But in this case I'm talking about exogenous factors – the information that is made available to people. There are a number of quality studies by noted climate scientists and oceanographers that would appear to dampen worries about climate change, or at least catastrophic climate change. However, these papers appear to be virtually ignored by the media. That is interesting.

There's a swath of reality that is being blacked out by major media outlets, and another swath that is being amplified and emotionalized. I think this is clear, and ideally wouldn't be controversial across the political spectrum."

You may or may not be following this story in the US National News, but there was a shocking image of a immigrant child washed ashore in the UK that made the airwaves-- Networks news shows like NBC's Today Show chose to air the pictures. Willie Geist, while anchoring as the images were displayed, boldly stated that "Powerful images change minds". He repeated himself on the air a day or two later, when the Prime Minister of the UK decided to accept more immigrants.

And yet, for the last several weeks there has been a whole slew of undercover videos released of Planned Parenthood with some shocking imagery and dialogue-- and NBC made a decision not to air the material (or the story) on the network. In other cases, undercover video showing the treatment of whales, chickens, and whatever else have made the air (and potentially changed minds).

The networks can't just air everything... but when a compelling image or a definite 'talker' story is out there, it's quite certain that the media has (and wields) substantial power to add a finger to the scale just by not airing things.

Reply
Sheri link
9/9/2015 03:20:09 pm

While there are no Christian cars or paper towels, there are Christian book stores and some very ornate churches. Some people wear jewelry that reflects their faith. There's a Christian dating sight that clearly uses religion to sell to customers. Christianity is not as in-your-face as environmentalists, but perhaps that's because Christianity works for converts, not laws to compel everyone to behave as they believe one should and believe what they do. If Christians wanted to be as aggressive and force people to go along, you'd probably see the cars, the houses, etc. that marked the true believers.
Arab countries have very strict rules that reflect their religion, including dress and the need to pray on schedule.

Reply
John
9/17/2015 09:00:08 pm

"Something I've been thinking about lately is how mediated and constructed our realities are."

"There's a swath of reality that is being blacked out by major media outlets, and another swath that is being amplified and emotionalized. I think this is clear, and ideally wouldn't be controversial across the political spectrum. What concerns me is that we may not be dealing with a purely political spectrum at this point."

It's all about the Narrative. If it fits that Narrative, it gets reported. If it doesn't fit the Narrative, it doesn't get reported. And everything that is reported is molded to fit the Narrative. The easiest way to see that is to attend a political even in person and then watch how it is reported in the news.

If you go to a "Pro-Choice" abortion protest or a gay rights protest, they'll go out of their way to portray the participants as normal, decent, and non-controversial people who you should like. A fairly detailed example can be found here and some of the truth leaked out because C-SPAN covered the event without carefully editing the images to fit the Narrative: http://ajrarchive.org/Article.asp?id=1613

Now contrast how left-wing protesters are are generally reported in the mainstream news with the plethora of pictures taken at left-wing protests on you can on this site: http://zombietime.com/

On the other side, the mainstream media will ignore a sea of decent and normal family people at an anti-abortion or anti-gay marriage event to find the handful of loons that make them look bad. That's how they create the Narrative.

Most media bias isn't about outright lies. It's about selective reporting. And when they can't spin a major story to fit the Narrative because it is so overt there is no way to spin it, they ignore the story. it's why they've ignored the Planned Parenthood videos and why they ignored the Kermit Gosnell case, because there was no happy pro-Narrative face they could put on it. Then the tactic becomes one of assuring people there is no story there and whatever they do, they absolutely should not watch the videos themselves.

The vast majority of media bias isn't outright lying (though there is plenty of that, often courtesy of reporters uncritically repeating talking-points from left-wing sources they like) but about selective reporting, pushing minor local incidents that really has no business being national news (Treyvon Martin and Ferguson) while ignoring other sensational incidents that have characteristics that would easily make them national news if they didn't undermine the Narrative (e.g., Kermit Gosnell, the Planned Parenthood videos, Jesse Dirkhising, Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom). Why wasn't the shooting of Akai Gurley, a young unarmed black man who was accidentally killed by a New York City police officer while doing nothing wrong more than a fleeting national news story? The officer who shot him wasn't white, so it didn't quite fit the Narrative the media wants to tell.

And the truly sad part about this is that once people discover the deception behind the Narrative and understand that the mainstream news is distorting things, they become susceptible to believing the competing narratives of the opposite extremes, which is what I believe happened with Dylann Roof. White racists promote a relatively small number of sensational cases of black-on-white crimes that the mainstream media doesn't report into their own narrative of a conspiracy against white people, and the media's selective reporting only gives credibility to their claims of conspiracy. They all need to stop selling narratives and start reporting facts.

Reply
John
9/17/2015 09:05:08 pm

I meant to post a warning that the Zombietime website is VERY NSFW and VERY inappropriate for minors. Feel free to edit my reply, if you can, to include that warning by the link. But that's the reality the media isn't showing you because they want the right to look like loons and people to believe the left are all nice, normal, and safe people.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    José L. Duarte

    Social Psychology, Scientific Validity, and Research Methods.

    Archives

    February 2019
    August 2018
    July 2017
    December 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

  • Home
  • Blog
  • Media Tips
  • Research
  • Data
  • An example
  • Haiku
  • About