The longer we wait to start, the greater the total cost and the more damage to the oceans.

1) Joe, you did assert there’s a significant gap in saying the paper doesn’t say how long the concentration of CO2 could overshoot Jim’s chosen goal of 350 ppm before tracking back to that level. That is a hugely important question in terms of how hard society has to work, and how quickly. Am I missing something?

2) Jim and I go back a long way, and I think — even though he’s focused on this “balance as bias” idea now — he’d see most of my 20 years of coverage as fair and ACCURATE. I’ve written repeatedly about the “tyranny of balance” in traditional news coverage and how it impedes effective coverage of complex science. (A book chapter including a discussion of this issue is here: http://www.onthemedia.org/ episodes/ 2006/ 12/ 08/ chapter.html)

That doesn’t mean stories can’t frame the extent of discourse (see my piece tonight on ecological disruption and climate). What they do need to do is characterize the voices and not just include them.

3) A Dot Earth post on a DRAFT paper posted by Jim expressly to gain review and comment is NOT the same as a news story written once that paper has been formally peer-reviewed and published in a journal. When Jim’s paper has passed those steps, I’ll write a fair and accurate story about it.

Quote: “I enjoy Revkin’s blog because I do believe it’s a fair and balanced coverage of the warming issue. In very few places do I actually see fair and balanced reporting or admissions of the uncertainties in exactly what is global warming, whether it really is bad and how do we curb it… Testament to Revkin’s job on this blog, which I have been reading since the beginning, is that I actually have no idea how he feels about the subject.”

Well, there you have it, Andy! You have generously conceived and created one of the most influential and popular blogs on environment and climate - under the prestigious banner of the NY Times, no less. And based on your “fair and balanced” style, at least some of your regular readership apparently “actually have no idea how he feels about the subject.”

Surely that is not the outcome that Revkin is aiming for, nor is it is personal opinion. Nonetheless, it is the direct outcome of his style of presenting the information.

I am also reminded of another comment on DotEarth, possibly on the same thread as my link, that lambasted the misuse of “balance” on issues that clearly do not warrant it. The poster imagined a caricature of a future NYTimes obituary to one of the Apollo astronauts that included commentary from the “the moon landings were a staged hoax in a hangar” crowd… for “balance” of course…

While I have a great admiration for the work that Andy is doing… KUDOS TO JOE AND JIM FOR CALLING HIM OUT ON THIS!

Please somebody define what the heck the rules are?

“The paper does suffer from one inherent analytical weakness that makes it (a tad) less dire than it appears — and some people believe the core element of this analysis is wrong (see very end of post), although I don’t.”

One weakness that might change the results “A tad” in a paper whose core analysis I agree with is not “some significant gaps” — in my book.

If I might get edgy:
We’ve all now read the cascade of bad scientific reports - the environmental equivalent of the “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.” report. Or perhaps more like Stalin’s reports of the massing German forces at the Russian border. If believe they’re going to attack - maybe you should do something about it!!!!!!!!

Yes, it’s true the day and time and the extent of global carnage are in question. Is The Times really going to continue the gentlemanly expenditure of resources and wait for the carnage? Although it feels like impending doom, we are at war with mother nature now - and her Panzer divisions are coming over the hill.

We must wait for a new Administration but what is The Times waiting for?

I cite Hansen so much since he’s been right longer than anybody else.

Hansen is the United States “climate change science czar”, if you will - right? He’s the General, the top dog - for The United States of America, right?

And what he’s done is give a “press preview” to a report that will be coming out later in Science - right? He’s self-leaked, not so covertly, if you will.

Can you imagine if a similarly positioned U.S. military general, 5 star minimum - probably must the the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, leaked a report prior to official publication stating that the U.S. has a “missile gap” with the Russians and the Russians are turning on all their U.S. targeting again and is proceeding toward launch, and now the only question is how many nuclear missiles we will be able to stop and which cities will be obliterated???????

Would The Times put that on their “military blog” or would it be A1, top, in 2″ letters?????!!!!!!!

Something is very wrong….

There are a number of feasible ways this drawdown might be accomplished. For example, one could grow algae and then dump it into the oil fields we shut down a few decades earlier. We could create GreenFreedom sort of plants powered by large solar farms in the deserts of the world, and likewise sequester the hydrocarbons that are produced. (I suggest sequestering hydrocarbons to CO2 for safety and density.) If we manage to touch 450ppm in 2050, and begin removal at 1ppm per year, we could get to 350ppm by 2150, as Joe suggests. 1ppm per year is a massive investment (think of half of our current coal and oil infrastructure combined–in reverse). Nonetheless, it will probably be a necessary investment. We should be planning on it.

Hansen is not just the most credible person out there, he’s the U.S. Government’s official authority on the subject.

Bush may choose to undermine the deadly serious statements of the professionals working for him - but why do others?

If we shrank our carbon footprints, what would happen to The Times’s advertising revenues?

What would happen to the circulation of the paper paper?

Is the Times in good enough shape to withstand these hits?

And if Times management chooses not to face them, what will be the hit to the paper’s reputation?

Fair enough. Hansen isn’t officially the “official authority”, as it were. But I’d say that’s a distinction without a difference.

I’d like to know what other individual in the U.S. Government has the same or greater command of the issue as Hansen does?

Anyone?

What counts is being the world’s foremost authority on some subject. James Hansen is cetainly that regarding climate change.

I would agree.

But to acknowledge that Hansen is The United States of America’s number one guy (not as a private citizen), gives him an institutional weight that not even the NY Times should be able discount.

(In fact the Times often sucks up to such power - but I digress….)

A blog is bylined and appears regularly under that byline, so it seems to me the rules for it should be the same as for a column: one’s own opinion, not subject to “slant” from the editorial board — unless otherwise stated, so that we are all forewarned.

Hopefully Andy does have a public position, and will tell us what it is, or, if the blog’s position is that of the power structure, that he will tell us so. To mix a couple of metaphors, knowing exactly whose voice is on the other end of the line is important when the Panzers are coming over the hill.

Oh, my opinion? That Mr. Hansen has earned the right not to gratuitously spun. I’m still hoping that’s not what happened here. I’m glad he’s reading and responding here, and I look for great things from him and/or from The NYT as we enter possibly the most dangerous period in human history.

Risa Stephanie Bear

“Rampant Negativity - No Reason to be so Glum - Predictably, as scientific evidence clarifies that the dangerous level of atmospheric CO2 is at hand, there are cries that it is impractical to avoid climate catastrophe. Such negativity is part of the playbook of those who stand to gain from business-as-usual. A recent report by the Scripps Howard News Service claims that I stated “we must reduce greenhouse gases by 80 percent within 12 years or it will be too late to prevent a climate catastrophe”. What nonsense.”

Read it all here -
http://www.columbia.edu/ ~jeh1/ mailings/ 20080324_Rampant.pdf

While my gut tells me it’s more dire than Hansen generally relates it, I for one think “the worst” can be avoided and we can stabilize levels and so too the climate. My humble contribution to fighting it is this checklist
http://checklisttowardzerocarbon.wordpress.com/
Download it, edit it for your local conditions, make it your own, and pass it on.

I agree - very little seems settled. For me it’s all about the trend lines. And I’d wager that 6 degrees is too conservative.

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/2352

Also, and maybe this is telling, the commenters on his blog seem to almost always be the same people and frankly I’m not nearly as interested in what they say as what people comment on here on this blog. The commenters there seem to find it necessary to just post a pro-forma statement of agreement and then put their signature at the bottom with a a URL. It is more venting than discussion.

Here, maybe because Joe is willing to take controversial stands, it seems as though many more of the comments (though not all) are worth reading (in my book).

Best,

d