theyeti

No, I'm not kidding. The last sentence that you quote, "I hope that means both.", was left out by Lomborg when he replied to Schneider's bashing in Sci-Am. I'm glad you included it. That already makes you more honest than he.

As for the substance of Schneider's words, Schneider himself does a pretty good job of explaining what he meant in the link you provided: (http://cyclotron.aps.org/apsnews/0896/11592.html)

I don't find any need to add to it.

I will however hasten to add that even if Schneider was advocating lying about science, kicking puppies, and eating babies, it has nothing to do whatsoever with his condemation of Lomborg. Schneider has written dozens upon dozens of papers, both academic and informal, not to mention a few books; he's one of the most highly respected researchers in his field. Out of Schneider's long and prolific writing career, Lomborg takes one paragraph which he can interpret disfavorably, cuts off the concluding sentence, and then uses that as an ad hominem to dismiss Schneider's criticisms. That's exactly the kind of tactic practiced by creationists and other professional liars.

theyeti

echidna

Actually I got Schneider's last line from Lomborg's website. Maybe it wasn't in the original book & I'd criticise Lomborg for that clumsiness, but even with the incluson of that last sentence, the paragraph is clearly a moral obligation for scientists to distort the truth.

Schneider's "hope" is only that, hope, it is no longer that absolute duty of scientists to remain objective.

theyeti

????

I'm afraid that's not how I read it at all. Echinda, have you read a large and representative cross-section of Schneider's writings? (I haven't.) If not, then I don't think you're in a position to dictate just what it is that he advocates. He says specifically that he has often railed against the position that you accuse him of. Unless you think he's lying, then your interpretation of that one paragraph is not consistent with his usual thoughts on the matter. (Which is a probable indication that you're misinterpreting it.)

As for Lomborg's chopping of the quote, he might not have done it in the response he wrote to Sci-Am. Apparently he and his supporters have done it many times though. (You can see someone doing it in that Slashdot thread that Jesse linked to.) Here is what John Rennie had to say about it in his response to Lomborg's rebuttal (full article here):

So I don't know if Lomborg chopped the quote in his response to Sci-Am, but apparently it's something he's made a habit of doing previously.

And again, I can't overemphasize 1) how unfair it is to judge a person, especially one with a long and well-regarded career, based on a single quote; and 2) how utterly irrelevant this is to Scheider's criticisms of Lomborg. If Scheider litterally had horns sticking out of his head and a pointy tail sticking out of his ass, it wouldn't matter one bit as far as his crtique is concerned.

theyeti

echidna

Look I sympathise with Schneider enormously & I admire his honesty, even if it is over the particularly difficult issue of scientific integrity. It IS an ethical dilemma. But at the same time, part of that dilemma is that Lomborg IS justified in criticising the distortion which this “soundbite” approach creates, just as Schneider does himself (although in that particular article, not strongly enough).

Maybe Schneider’s interpretations of what is ethical manipulation of the truth and what is not, are OK. I don't know how to judge this, but neither do I think that the scientist should be deciding this for themselves under cloak of secrecy either. But at the same time, there is a shitload of “scientific” material out there in the environmental sciences which is simply bad science, where the scenarios are misleading, where the doubts have been obscured. But at the same time, there does not seem to be adequate criticism of this from within Science, that there is a plethora of bad science. Like some of the criticism of Lomborg, much of this criticism is howled down as being “against the Cause” & environmental scientists and their critics are very polarised along political lines, more so than in most other fields.

And this is what Moore is at great pains to be highlighting as well. It’s worth noting that Moore was one of the founders of Greenpeace.

SULPHUR

How many countries have not signed the protocal?

Kinross

Doesn't really matter. Many of those that have are no where near complying with it.

SULPHUR

The USA, australia make a large statement about their concern

echidna

On Kyoto, while I don’t necessarily agree with the protocol itself, or at least believe that a lot more open discussion was needed (rather than the muted discussions driven to date by environmental lobbyists), I still don’t support the US or Australia’s refusal to sign.

Rightly or wrongly there is clearly overwhelming international support for this direction & for the protocol to have any effect, international cooperation is essential. As part of any international community, one must recognise that consensus does not always fall one’s way, but in the end, for that community to retain the cohesiveness which it requires, one still needs to fall inline with the majority.

Further, neither the US or Australia proposed any meaningful alternative to the protocol, & nothing resembling Lomborg’s suggestion to diverting these additional costs towards other forms of international development.