Science – Page 113 – a sibilant intake of breath

Climate change all over the news

Sorry to be less esoteric and entertaining in my writing recently, but I have been focused by necessity on issues pertinent to ongoing projects. The process distorts one’s perception of the world. I cannot really judge, for instance, the extent to which the apparent increase in coverage of climate change issues in the media is (a) the product of my increased focus on those stories, (b) the result of cyclical phenomena, like the release of IPCC reports, or (c) a demonstration of increased awareness – or at least increased newsworthiness – of the climate change situation. With that caveat stated, it certainly seems as though climate change related stories are getting top billing in the media to an increasing degree.

The front page of today’s Globe and Mail site features four articles on climate change. One is on climate change and Parliamentary politics, another deals with the proper role of scientists. There is a question and answer session, and finally an article on the impact of rising sea levels on Indonesia. Many organizations, including the BBC, now have dedicated portions on their websites to cover climate change news.

Even President Bush has acknowledged the need to take action. It’s enough to make one hope that a massive shift from talk to action might take place within the next few years, going beyond Kyoto and into the realm of mechanisms to substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions and move into a post fossil fuel economy.

From the perspective of a concerned citizen, this all seems like good news. It is very important to reach as good an understanding about the likely costs and benefits of climate change as possible. Also essential is the development of political consensus to take action to prevent climate change and mitigate the impact. From the perspective of a graduate student working partially on climate change, it is all quite overwhelming. It makes one wonder how relevant one’s research will be in a year or two. Additionally, it makes it seem less likely that one can add anything new to the discussion. My hope is that by drawing together more types of information than most people will be examining, I will be able to develop some insights. The degree to which my thesis will be a real contribution to scholarship largely depends on it.

Excellent BBC nature series

Anyone interested in nature or geography should have a look at the spectacular television series “Planet Earth.” I watched a couple of episodes on Antonia’s very large television and was thoroughly impressed by the quality of the videography and the lengths they went to in order to get amazing imagery. I saw the episode featuring Lechuguilla Cave and another on mountains. Without a doubt, it is the best nature documentary series I have seen since The Blue Planet. Both were made by the BBC, and may constitute the strongest endorsement I have seen for that broadcaster.

I have been tempted many times to buy the DVD set of The Blue Planet, but don’t think it would be wise to buy the European version, which will not play on most North American devices. Both The Blue Planet and Planet Earth also have rather good websites. If you are in the UK, you can even download high resolution video clips. Unfortunately, they are only available as Windows-only DRM-protected Windows Media Player clips: hardly what you would want from a public broadcaster. Mac users will have to be satisfied with an excellent new background image.

International law and the environment

Next Wednesday, I have volunteered to give a presentation to my international law seminar on the following questions:

Why has the regulation of CFCs been a success while the Kyoto Protocol has failed?
Should the USA join the Kyoto Protocol, and if so, why?
What roles have been played by Governments, NGOs and international organizations in the development of international environmental law? What is the basis of their authority in this field?

Substitute persistent organic pollutants (POPs) for Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), and it is a very good match for my thesis.

To give very short answers:

Because there were substitutes readily available, the science was strong, and the cost of dealing with the problem reasonable, in the case of CFCs. Climate change is more difficult on all counts. (See the paper I wrote on the Stockholm Convention for my First Nations politics class in 4th year.)
Yes, because it is a first step on the way to an agreement or collection of agreements that will stabilize GHG emissions, in the medium term. Ultimately, doing so will be much cheaper than suffering climate change, and will not carry the same terrible social and ecological costs.
Their authority is based on expertise and legitimacy. See my thesis, in 88 days’ time for a more comprehensive answer.

Reading some more of the international law involved should be both interesting and useful. This is probably the first time the environment has been specifically addressed in any course that I have taken at Oxford.

PS. Much as I hate to reveal a fact that I might later win bets with friends about, I feel compelled to tell one that I learned earlier today from Kate. The polar bear (Ursus maritimus), has black skin: a feature that helps it to absorb energy from the sun, and thus keep the bear warm.

Categorizing thesis sources

I am splitting the literature review chapter for my thesis into two sections: the first about general materials relating to the role of science in environmental policy, and the second about the specific case studies. This bit is for the beginning of the general section, intended both to demonstrate the scope of appropriate materials and put them into a kind of comprehensible framework:

Within the realm of the general scholarship about expertise, legitimacy, and the application of science to the development of political solutions to environmental problems, there is a spectrum of discussion. At one end is the work most explicitly and restrictively concerned with questions within science itself. The deliberations of Popper, Kuhn, and their colleagues are frequently of this nature. The next band in the spectrum is work that relates to the social roles of scientists, within a broader social context. Here, the work of Haas on epistemic communities is particularly important. So too are deliberations within the scientific community itself over what it means to be a scientist. At a still-lengthening wavelength are explicit discussions about the political role that scientists should play: how, for instance, they should present their findings to policy makers, and whether it is appropriate to adopt political stances. Next come discussions about the same question, only from the political – rather than the scientific – point of view. How do politicians and political theorists view the process of delegation to scientists and scientific bodies? Finally, there are the most explicitly political and philosophical questions about things like the nature of international justice and the relationship between humanity and nature. In the following extended discussion, I will employ this organizational structure: moving from the high energy, short-wavelength considerations of science from within to the long wave questions of abstract political theory, keeping in mind the reality that these discussions are entangled with one another at many points.

What do you think of the metaphor? Too simplistic for a work of this sort, or useful as a means of categorizing? If I had to place myself on this spectrum, I would probably be in the yellow band: closer to red than to green. Most of the reading I have been doing – and a lot of what interests me most – is in the blue to violet range, though blaring red is not without appeal.

Also, it should be noted that I have far more sources of the first kind (general) than of the second (case study specific). This has a lot to do with how people keep suggesting the former and not the latter. Anyone who knows of any especially good writing on either the Stockholm Convention on POPs or the Kyoto Protocol is strongly encouraged to let me know about it. The library resources at Oxford, especially on Stockholm, are a bit patchy.

Time, and our imperfect orbit

_{In keeping with the dictates of thesis writing, and the sage comments of those who suggest that blog entries are not the best use of time, I resolve the following: posts on this blog between now and the completion of a draft thesis shall be limited to no more than one substantive and one narrative post per day, the latter to generally include a photograph. Posts that pertain directly to the substantive content of the thesis, as designated by the M.Phil Thesis category, are exempt from these restrictions.}

An article in Harper’s that I first took up because of its hyperbolic title – “Clash of the Time Lords: Who will own the measure of our days?” – is actually a really interesting demonstration of how human beings try to make the world fit within our understanding.

In particular, the article hinges on the fact that the second has two distinct definitions. The first is based on astronomical phenomena: 1/86,400th of a day, that being 1/365.25th of the time it takes for the Earth to orbit the sun. The second is based on the extremely precise oscillation of cesium atoms, the measuring stick used in atomic clocks. Specifically, it is 9,192,631,770 oscillations. The trouble arises from how those two are not the same; the Earth does not sweep through its orbit with perfect precision. Rather, it wobbles, hits things, and slows down. As such, astronomical time ‘slows down’ as compared with atomic time.

Right now, this is corrected for using occasional leap seconds. Every time the Earth has lagged behind atomic time by one second, one second is added to the reckoning of atomic clocks. Since our orbit continues to slow, leap seconds need to be inserted with ever greater frequency. This is good for astronomers, since it lets them continue to aim their telescopes in the same way as before. What is more controversial is whether this is a sensible system overall.

From a galactic or universal perspective, it doesn’t seem too reasonable. Ultimately, it is a throwback to the era when it was believed that the Earth occupies some metaphysically special place in the universe. When we concede that it is just one of uncountable numbers of things zipping about under the influence of gravity and other forces, the idea that time should be altered to correct for the peculiarities of its orbit becomes a difficult one to maintain, for any reasons aside from the practical ones of astronomers. Consider, for instance, the question of whether it would be appropriate to subtract a period of time if a comet or asteroid impact cause the orbit of the Earth to speed up.

That said, there are a good number of practical reasons to consider fiddling with time to match our orbit. The disjoint between calendar time and astronomical time is the reason for the piecemeal and difficult shift the world has made from the Julian to Gregorian calendars. Indeed, the point was to return key astronomical events, like the equinoxes, to the points in the calendar where they ‘should’ be. That shift famously required the negation of eleven days. For those who followed the decree of Pope Gregory XIII, they were October 5-14th, 1582. People in the UK and US didn’t switch systems until later, erasing September 3-13th, 1752. As such, the measure of time differed be eleven days across the English channel. When the US and UK did make the switch, the passage of calendar time was re-aligned with the experience of astronomical time.

Over thousands of years, allowing atomic time to rule, and diverge to an ever greater extent from astronomical time, would shift the seasons into ever different positions within the calendar. Very slowly, sunrise and sunset times would get out of sync with the times of day when they previously happened: likewise, the solstices and equinoxes. Already, the GPS satellites, which rely critically on super precise time, are 14 seconds ahead of UTC (Coordinated Universal Time). This is because they have not been counting leap seconds. Time in Unix computer systems also ignores leap seconds. As more leap seconds are added to UTC, that gap will grow.

Perhaps this is the most obvious solution: acknowledge the split and come up with two separate accountings of time: one that just counts the oscillations of those cesium atoms and thus the actual number of atomically defined seconds that pass, and another that corrects those figures for the peculiarities of our passage through space. Most people would probably only bother with the latter, but having the former as a kind of absolute record of how much time has passed since event X strikes me as more honest.

PS. Slightly related to the above is this excellent comic about dinosaurs planning to steal the prototype kilogram (the actual hunk of platinum–iridium that defines the unit of mass).

Genetically modifying photosynthesis

The European perspective on the genetic modification of foods generally seems like an unrelentingly negative one. While the dangers inherent to tinkering with nature are real and should be discussed, there are nonetheless a lot of appealing uses for the technology.

One significant example has to do with photosynthesis: the process whereby plants produce sugars from carbon dioxide and sunlight, generating oxygen as a by-product. Some plants use enzymes to turn CO2 into sugars composed of three carbon atoms (these are called C3 plants) while others have an enzyme (PEP Carboxylase) that allows them to produce four carbon sugars (C4 plants). The latter variety are much better at turning solar energy into sugars at temperatures above 25 degrees Celsius. The evolution of the C4 process has apparently taken place more than fifty times, in nineteen families of plant. Helping a few more important plants make the transition seems like it could be very beneficial.

C4 plants can be up to 50% more efficient than C3 ones in hot climates, while also using less water and nitrogen. Maize, a C4 plant, can yield a harvest of 12 tonnes per acre, while rice, a C3 plant, does no better than eight. If we could genetically modify rice to be a G4 plant, we could simultaneously increase crop yields, reduce the water and fertilizer needs of farmers in hot areas, and produce crops that would be less vulnerable to global warming. While there could certainly be some nasty unintended consequence of doing so, that does not seem like sufficient cause not to try.

The idea that the foods we eat now are ‘natural’ is not one that meshes very well with the fact that they have been ceaselessly modified, over thousands of years, through selective breeding. While there may be special dangers involved in mixing genes in the lab rather than out in the fields, there are also special opportunities, like the one listed above. It will be interesting to see if someone manages to pull it off.

Meat, methane, and global warming

Apparently, there is quite a substantial connection between the global meat industry and global warming. A report from the Food and Agriculture Organization concludes that the livestock industry generates 18% of all greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The figure includes feed production, the raising of animals themselves, as well as the transport and refrigeration of meat. Collectively, that is a larger share than all transport: cars, planes, etc. That quantity is both highly significant, and disproportionate to how livestock represents only 1.5% of global GDP. The report also describes the contribution of the meat industry to land degradation, water scarcity, and diminishing biodiversity. A summary of the report is also available.

Largely because of farming animals for meat, global concentrations of methane have more than doubled since the pre-industrial period. While those concentrations are still much lower than those of carbon dioxide, methane has 21 times more effect per unit volume. This seems unlikely to slow down any time soon, since global meat consumption has increased five-fold since 1950, and the rising GDP of many populous countries seems destined to perpetuate that trend.

Perhaps public figures hoping to show that they are serious about global warming should embrace vegetarianism or veganism instead of hybrid cars. While it is good that Canada’s Food Guide to Healthy Eating has been changed to list “Meat and Alternatives” as one of the four food groups, perhaps they should be more aggressively promoting a meat-free lifestyle; it is almost certainly healthier, and makes ethical and environmental sense as well.

This sort of reading often makes me feel that I should take the full leap to becoming vegan. That said, almost all the best things I eat involve milk or eggs. Giving up beef and tuna (with rare sashimi exceptions) was difficult enough. Giving up cheese is practically unthinkable.

Uncertainty and morality

Speaking with Professor Henry Shue today about some of the normative issues that arise from science based policymaking, uncertainty was an area of particular interest. Specifically, when policy makers are required to make decisions under conditions of uncertainty, what special moral obligations arise as the result. An example of such uncertainty is the magnitude of harm likely to result from climate change.

To me, it seems that two types of duties arise fundamentally from such uncertainty. The first is an investigative duty. This falls upon policy makers directly, in the form of obligations to develop a reasonable understanding of the issues at hand, and it manifests itself through delegation to experts who can conduct more rigorous and comprehensive research. Within this obligation, there are specific rules of procedure embedded: for instance, a willingness to keep an open mind. Without such an approach, evidence will simply be discounted (Kuhn’s SoSR is helping me to refine my thinking about these procedural rules). A more contentious component of this obligation has to do with resources. It seems like more should be devoted to problems that: (a) have a greater potential impact and (b) have a greater effect upon the constituents to whom the policy maker is responsible. The second criterion there has both a moral basis (because of the nature of representative legitimacy) and a practical basis (because it would be a waste of time for the Inuit Circumpolar Conference to focus their resources on desertification in Africa).

The second type of duty is to take preventative action and/or action to mitigate the damage that will be done by what has become inevitable. Deciding how much to allocate in total, as well as how to subdivide it, is tricky both for practical and moral reasons. Both prevention and mitigation have distributive consequences; they also involve arbitration between competing rights. Do people, for instance, have the right to live in areas more likely to flood, due to climate change, or do they just have the right to live in comparable conditions anywhere? Who has the duty to provide the material requirements of satisfying such rights? When it comes to climate change, the idea that people have a right to that which they have simply owned or done for a long time is problematic, not least because many such ‘legacy’ activities contribute to the problem at hand.

While I certainly cannot provide answers to any of these questions here, I can hopefully do so in the thesis. Indeed, the three big areas of moral discussion that keep cropping up are: (a) dealing with uncertainty (b) social roles and (c) the nature of ‘technical’ solutions to environmental problems. All three offer the chance to delve into some of the moral complexities concealed within the idea of science-driven policy.

Note to self: look up Trevor Pinch and Sheila Jasanoff, within the ‘Science, Technology, and Society’ school of research in the United States.

Sex discrimination in the sciences

Please note that much of the following is shamelessly stolen from a blog called Pharyngula: a stage in vertebrate embryonic development where all species look similar. This post, specifically, made me aware of the issue and most of these sources.

A letter in the July 14th issue of Nature draws attention to the possibility of sex discrimination in the European Young Investigator Awards, issued by the European Science Foundation. The awards provide up to 1.25 million Euros for research, but only 12% of them went to women, despite more than 25% of applicants being female. The chances of that distribution occurring as the result of random variation is less than 0.05%. The September 8th issue features a response, but it isn’t terribly convincing.

Of course, it is possible that the work submitted by women was less worthy of funding. Further research, however, suggests that this is not the case. A study by Christine Wenneras and Agnes Wold (“Nepotism and sexism in peer-review,” Nature 387, 341−343; 1997 – Oxford Full Text) includes some very dispiriting findings. The study looked at applicants to the Medical Research Council in Sweden. As part of their consideration, applicants are given a score for ‘scientific competence.’ In the Wenneras and Wold study, the productivity history of male and female scientists in Europe was evaluated using ‘impact points.’ For example, a publication in Science or Nature is worth about 23 points, whereas “an excellent specialist journal such as Atherosclerosis, Gut, Infection and Immunity, Neuroscience or Radiology” would be worth three points. Based on this approach, Wenneras and Wold concluded that “a female applicant had to be 2.5 times more productive than the average male applicant to receive the same competence score as he.”

That’s really awful. Indeed, it goes a long way towards discrediting the notion that the scientific community is capable of unbiased appraisal. While the study doesn’t tell us whether problems extend beyond the Medical Research Council, it certainly seems to warrant further examination. A lot more studies are discussed in this article.

Would it be feasible or beneficial to introduce a system wherein those reviewing scientific work could be kept from knowing whose work they are assessing? While that is possible for individual articles, it doesn’t seem possible in the context of grants or promotions. I would expect that most scientific disciplines are small enough that reviewers could pretty easily identify the source of work, even if personal details are removed from the copies they examine. That is especially true in the context of choosing who to promote within a particular university department. How, then, could greater fairness be achieved? I would be especially interested in suggestions from women doing academic work in the sciences.

Conciousness raising through free DVDs

There is a website that will supposedly send you a free DVD copy of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. Some statistics are up, on how many tickets and discs they have given away. I have placed a request, and I will let you know if it actually works. They seem to be overwhelmed with thousands of requests at the moment, so that seems pretty unlikely.

If they do send me one, I will make sure to screen it publicly at least once. The case Gore makes is rigorous and compelling; this is also an interesting demonstration of how science, politics, and advocacy run together. I wrote about the film earlier.