Thursday, February 22, 2007

Global-warming non-experts

I got a few angry letters last year, when I challenged Time magazine's claim, in a major Time cover story, that the debate over global warming was over. Certainly, I wrote, the consensus leans toward the view that humans are causing global warming, and it will have significant negative effects. But there are still a few major meteorologists and climatologists out there who dispute their peers' findings. I, like most journalists, wrestle with the question of how to make use of this small minority: If we quote people like MIT's Richard Lindzen in every story about global warming, does that give them a voice disproportionate to their numbers? (The Globe's Alex Beam highlighted Lindzen's views in this recent column.)

So I'm hardly one to quash debate. But the conservative National Review's new blog, Planet Gore -- it launched last week -- is an embarrassment to the cause of global-warming skepticism. (Some contributors to the blog are outright skeptics of many of the claims by scientists about global warming and its effects; others appear to accept them but think more scientific research, not conservation or economic regulation, is the proper response.) Here's the mission statement:

NRO [National Review Online} has gathered a team of experts to report and comment on the myriad scientific and economic issues surrounding the global warming debate. So check back regularly for informed news and views about climate change, alternative energy, environmental activism, and of course, Al Gore's carbon footprint.

So far I count six contributors on the blog -- none of whose credentials appear to be provided on the Web site. So I did some Googling. Here's whom NRO has tapped for their expertise:

1. The online editor of National Review.
2. A "Web manager and blogger" from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a pro-free-market think tank.
3. A senior fellow at the Discovery Institute (best known for its work in defense of creationism), with a Ph.D. from the Princeton Theological Seminary.
4. An English "expat businessman," who writes a popular economics blog.
5. A senior fellow at the C.E.I., with a BA from Oxford, an MBA from the University of London, and a "Diploma of Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine." (I'm not sure what this last is.)
6. A resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, with a doctorate in environmental science from UCLA and a c.v. filled with stints at pro-free-market think tanks.

I'll correct those descriptions if NRO decides to post more information. Everyone is reasonably smart and witty, and at least three of the bloggers appear to be have knowledge of economics and statistics, which is certainly relevant. But really: Not one climatologist or meteorologist? No one thought to call, say, a chemist who studies the issues involved?

Compare the above credentials with those of the contributors to Realclimate.org, whose views are more in line with Al Gore's.

I'd love to read a blog co-written by Lindzen and William Gray, of Colorado State, two of the best-known, best-credentialed dissenters from the global-warming CW. But NRO's contribution to the debate, so far, is awfully, awfully feeble.

[Credit: I learned of Planet Gore via Best of Both Worlds, whose author raises an eyebrow at the presence of the theologian from the Discovery Institute.]

UPDATE: I've added links to Planet Gore and its mission statement, which I failed to include the first time around.

Posted by Christopher Shea at 11:07 AM

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