Links of Interest on WIPO, Global Warming, and Lord George

The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Patent Cooperation Treaty has seen a record of 145,300 patent applications filed in 2006. The US, Japan, Germany, South Korea, and France take the first five spots with the US representing 34.1% (see here).

Although economists have not much to add to the scientific debate on global warming, they have much to say on the political economy of it. This is why I recommend watching the documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle (it takes a bit more than an hour and, as Chris pointed out in the comments, it was not made by the BBC).

Is a central bank governor admitting playing with fire possible? Yes, Eddie George, the former Bank Governor of the Bank of England (nothing less) admitted that “the Bank of England deliberately stoked the consumer boom that has led to record house prices and personal debt in order to avert a recession” (this is from the article here). Bank Governors rarely admit that they don’t know what they are doing. More transparency of heart and mind is needed...

Thanks to FG, NA, and EW for the pointers.

Comments

[ChrisB]

The Great Global Warming Swindle, made by Martin Durkin, a committed Marxist and former member of the Revolutionary Communist Party (Google it if you don't believe me), is baloney. You have to be very gullible, very ignorant or a blinkered anti-environmentalist zealot to find it credible enough to recommend it.

This, for example, is what Carl Wunsch, one of the scientists featured in the program, had to say about his appearance in it (excerpt; source: RealClimate.org):

--In the part of the "Swindle" film where I am describing the fact that the ocean tends to expel carbon dioxide where it is warm, and to absorb it where it is cold, my intent was to explain that warming the ocean could be dangerous---because it is such a gigantic reservoir of carbon. By its placement in the film, it appears that I am saying that since carbon dioxide exists in the ocean in such large quantities, human influence must not be very important --- diametrically opposite to the point I was making --- which is that global warming is both real and threatening in many different ways, some unexpected.

--Many of us feel an obligation to talk to the media---it's part of our role as scientists, citizens, and educators. The subjects are complicated, and it is easy to be misquoted or quoted out context. My experience in the past is that these things do happen, but usually inadvertently --- most reporters really do want to get it right.

--Channel 4 now says they were making a film in a series of "polemics". There is nothing in the communication we had (much of it on the telephone or with the film crew on the day they were in Boston) that suggested they were making a film that was one-sided, anti-educational, and misleading. I took them at face value---clearly a great error. I knew I had no control over the actual content, but it never occurred to me that I was dealing with people who already had a reputation for distortion and exaggeration.--

Here is some evidence of the this reputation, from a March 2000 Guardian article (on an issue unrelated to climate change):

--In October 1998, a television producer named Martin Durkin took a proposal to the BBC's science series, Horizon. Silicone breast implants, he claimed, far from harming women, were in fact beneficial, reducing the risk of breast cancer. Horizon commissioned a researcher to find out whether or not his assertion was true. After a thorough review, the researcher reported that Mr Durkin had ignored a powerful body of evidence contradicting his claims. Martin Durkin withdrew his proposal. Instead of dropping it, however, he took it to Channel 4 and, astonishingly, sold it to their science series, Equinox.--

One last point: The documentary was not made by the BBC, despite the credibility that would have given it (good attempt, though--did your friends at TCS teach you that one?).

Really, really lame, Frederic.

[frederic]

Chris,

Thank you for your long comment. I have no particular opinion with regard to the scientific quality of the documentary. I view it as part of the political economy of global warming -- how the different sides are trying to influence public opinion and how groups try to impact political choices.

Thus thank you for explaining the flaws (as you see them) of the documentary, including the fact that it was not made by the BBC (something I didn't know -- I took what my source told me as correct). I am sorry if they misrepresented your view. I hope you will have the opportunity to explain your view again.

Frederic

PS: FYI, I have no special friends at TCS, I have published in this outfit only once, and I don't even know the editor. They agreed with the ideas we presented in our work on Montenegro and asked us to write something. That's all.

[ChrisB]

I apologize if I sounded a harsh or rude in my comment. I'm just a big admirer of Austrian economics and am nervous of its association with climate change denial. AA already has an unearned credibility problem, so I don't think it should earn itself another one by associating itself with the what is unquestionably an unscientific movement, for want of a better word.
Funnily enough, the guy who first got me into Austrian economics (Hayek, in fact) was David Henderson, former chief economist of the OECD and scourge of the IPCC, in the course of a long conversation I had with him in his office in London in which he pretty much converted me to the skeptical view of which I am now myself extremely skeptical.

[ChrisB]

For anyone unsure about the existence or implications of a scientific consensus on the issue of climate change, MIT is publishing a book on this in September. It's called "Climate Change." Here's part of the blurb for it, which I think is of relevance here:

--If people don't quite understand the seriousness of climate change, it is partly because politicians and the media have misrepresented the scientific community's strong consensus on it--politicians by selectively parsing the words of mainstream scientists, and the media by presenting "balanced" accounts that give the views of a small number of contrarians equal weight with empirically supported scientific findings.--

And Frederic, you are still advertising the Swindle documentary as a BBC documentary. Whether or not you realize this, that's a textbook disinformation trick, bestowing credibility on the incredible (sort of thing that happens at TCS, a PR outlet).

There's much more wrong with the documentary than I have mentioned (including the maker's admitting to using out-of-date data and to having doctored graphs). And your misrepresentation-of-my-views interpretation of why I (and so many other people, regardless of their views on the issue) find it objectionable, apart from being illogical, really doesn't get to the heart of the matter. My view is irrelevant. I'm not a scientist. What is of relevance is the fact that the maker of the documentary is, as implied by one of the people interviewed in the program, not someone who wants to get the science right.

As a scholar, how can you not be highly suspicious of that documentary considering all the credible, easily-discoverable evidence out there that sows doubt on the motives and methods of its maker? I think it's a bit of a stretch to imagine that even if the science is cynically misrepresented, the political economy stuff is still okay.

Apart from the global warming stuff, great blog BTW.

[Steve]

You said it, Chris. You are not a scientist.

[ChrisB]

Steve, If you're saying that science should be left to scientists, then yes, I think that's true. In the case of climate change, there's an abolute consensus within peer-reviewed sicnce that it's real and that humans are playing a role. There's not a single climate scientist whose research has passed peer review who disagrees with that. I think you just confirmed my point.

[Steve]

Chris, a truth of scientific research is that over time the majority of it gets disproven. So a peer reviewed paper now may not be that accurate in 10, 20 or 50 years. That's science and scientific inquiry for you, buddy. Perhaps you should chill out. Excuse the pun.
Steve

[ChrisB]

Steve, This thread has now moved from climate change denial to rejecting the worth of the whole of science. Again, you seem to be making my point for me. Keep it up!

[Steve]

You misunderstand. I'm not rejecting the worth of science at all. I am saying that theories come and go, papers come and go. We'll only now whether they were correct in time. Try to be open minded.

[ChrisB]

Steve, What you are suggesting necessarily entails the rejection of the worth of the whole of science.

As for my keeping an open mind: There's open-mindedness, and then there's brains falling out, and climate change denial clearly tends strongly toward the latter--for many reasons, some of which I've touched on.

[Steve]

Chris, it doesn't entail the rejection of science. You are wrong. It just means that science evolves. There are a lot of variables involved. You appear to have a bee in your bonnet, but the level of commitment to your cause is to be admired. It's kind of funny, but it should be admired nonetheless.

[ChrisB]

Steve, I should reject climate science because science evolves and there are a lot of variables involved. What does that even mean? And what cause are you referring to? I can see the future of Austrian Economics is assured with guys like you on board.

[Steve]

I didn't say either, you silly boy. And I am not an Austrian economist.

[Matt C.]

Here is a link to Cafe Hayek where there is a skeptic of global warming. He must not be a scientist, since he doesn't agree with the whole of the science community right Chris?

http://cafehayek.typepad.com/hayek/2007/03/richard_lindzen.html

[Rafe Champion]

Somewhere there is a paper by Lomborg which states that climate change is real and human activities contribute, but the Kyoto response makes no sense on scientific or economic grounds. Of course he could be wrong on both counts but it looks like the kind of nuanced position that is required to get a grip on the situation. Who has got the training, the time and the energy to get on top of the issues and take an informed and independent position?

Getting back to economics, what was Lord George doing at the Bank of England, slashing interests rates to stimulate demand, is he an unreconstructed Keynesian?

[ChrisB]

Matt, There are scientists who reject the theory of human-induced climate change, but not in a peer-reviewed context (see history of Austrian Economics, for example). Peer review can be problematical, but we have very little reason to believe that it is in this instance.

[ChrisB]

... the "history of Austrian Economics" bit was supposed to be in the problems-with-peer-review sentence.

Rafe: Yes, Even Lomberg said it is real and human-induced. Unfortunately, pro-free-marketeers often confuse the bad proposed solutions to it with the veracity of the science underlying it. That is illogical and dangerous. The nuance you mention is surely what is required. And bad plans like Kyoto certainly don't justify propaganda like the Swindle documentary.

[Steve]

Chris,
the swindle documentary (which I have watched) isn't propaganda. It is just a different view point from your own. I think you need to be a little more open minded
Steve