The mark of a true scientist

The web has had stories recently about prominent physicist and climate-change skeptic Richard Muller. Muller was skeptical that the global temperature changes thus far were really anything more than natural variation, so he launched a major study to review the best available data on past global temperatures, a study funded in part by the Charles Koch Foundation, a major supporter of global-warming deniers.

The study in fact did not show current warming was within the limits of normal variation, but instead reinforced other studies that have shown an abnormal warming trend.  So he did what a good scientist does – he publically changed his position on the basis of the data.

This is actually the way science is supposed to work.  Someone does a study that supports some theory. They make all the details of their study public so their peers can examine it in detail. Someone else is critical of the study because they hold a different theory, so they do another study to test the theories again, perhaps in a different way.  When the results of that study support the first theory, they abandon their own theory.

There have been some snide things written in the popular press about (a) his original position questioning the climate-warming theory, and (b) his change of mind.  This is unfair.  Science depends (a) on people who critically and skeptically examine and question and test other people’s theories, and (b) on changing one’s views when one’s theories are disproved by real-world tests and data.  Richard Muller provided an essential and important function by being skeptical of the climate-warming theory and testing it again, and he showed himself a scientist in the truest sense by being willing to change his mind on the basis of his test and data.

If only we had more Richard Mullers in the world.

Words vs deeds

The following graph from the Bureau of Economic Analysis tells the story this month:

President Obama has promised us lots of things since he took office, but in the end results matter more than words. We are having the worst recovery on record, a far worse recovery that President Reagan's 1982-85 recovery.  He would like to blame it on all kinds of things - the Republicans, the Euro crisis, President Bush, the millionaire CEOs, etc, etc, etc.  But in the end, he has been at the helm through this recovery, so inevitably he owns this recovery for better or for worse -- and it seem to be worse, looking at the last quarter's miserable 1.5% growth rate.

Recommended: Global Warming's Terrifying New Math

The August 2 issue of Rolling Stone magazine has an article worth reading: Global Warming's Terrifying New Math. As the world swelters through the hottest summer on record (quote from the opening paragraph):

June broke or tied 3,215 high-temperature records across the United States. That followed the warmest May on record for the Northern Hemisphere – the 327th consecutive month in which the temperature of the entire globe exceeded the 20th-century average.

the political and economic forces of the world continue on as if nothing were happening, and the climate change deniers (many of them politicians) continue to hold steadfastly to their view that this is just "natural variation".

The current economic problems in Europe and the US are getting all the attention, but the changing climate is probably a far, far worse problem, with far more significant consequences in both human and economic terms.

Theory vs Belief

I had an interesting conversation last night with a friend who is a chemist.  We were discussion the difference between a testable theory and a non-testable theory, in the context of the evolution vs creationism debate.  I had proposed that everything we know is really just a theory – whether the sun will come up tomorrow, whether our child’s name is Kara, whether our favorite political candidate will or will not do what she/he is promising, etc, etc.  For some theories we have lots of supporting evidence, for others little or no supporting evidence. But all are just theories.

He suggested a different approach, and I think a better way to look at the issue. He proposed that there are theories and beliefs, and the difference between them is the attitude one holds about them.

Theories are the provenance of those who are seeking truth, seeking to figure out how the world really operates. We see something happen.  We think up a theory that might explain what happened.  We then try to figure out how to test the theory to see if it is right.  If it passes our test we still don’t know if it is right, but at least that is some supporting evidence, and we go on looking for other tests.

If our theory fails the test we do finally know something positive – we know that our theory is wrong, so we modify the theory or abandon it and look for another plausible theory.   But the motivation is to find the truth about the world, or at least to find ever better and better approximations of the truth.

Newton’s laws are really just theories, but they passed all the tests for centuries, so people became pretty confident of them and started calling them “laws”.  And in fact they are pretty good approximations for big things moving as slow speeds. We now know this theory breaks down at quantum levels and for things approaching the speed of light, and we have new theories for those conditions.

Now beliefs are something entirely different. Beliefs are things we think a priori are true. With beliefs we aren’t looking for truth; we believe we already have the truth.  And we aren’t much interested in looking for confirming evidence, and we certainly aren’t very receptive to any evidence that might challenge or disprove our belief.

In a sense the difference is between humility and arrogance. Theories are a form of humility – we might well be wrong and if so we want to find out and correct it.  Beliefs are a form of arrogance – we are SURE we are right and any other view is wrong, and we certainly don’t see any need question the belief.

In this sense then, the theory of evolution is indeed “just a theory”, as creationists claim.  Over the years a very great deal of evidence has accumulated to support the general outlines of this theory, but specific tests of it have led us to continually modify and refine it, and that process will continue, making the theory an ever closer approximation to how the world really works.

In this same sense creationism isn’t a theory; it is a belief. Creationists aren’t seeking truth – they are sure they already have the truth.  They don’t need evidence, and they certainly aren’t actively trying to test or disprove their belief.

So the real difference isn’t in the “content” of the theory or belief.  The real difference is in the attitude of the proposer of the theory or belief.  Of course it is still true that some theories are untestable, and so not accessible to scientific examination. But that doesn’t make them beliefs, just untestable theories.  And it is equally true that some beliefs are testable, but they still remain beliefs so long as the person holding them isn’t interested in testing them, and isn’t prepared to abandon the belief if it fails the test.

And of course creationism COULD be a theory, and even a scientific theory, if it made predictions that could be tested and if it were possible to falsify it -- that is if it were a theory held by someone who wanted to really test it.  And of course the theory of evolution COULD be a belief (and probably is for some people) if it were held by someone who was absolutely sure it was true and wasn't interested in testing it and wasn't receptive to contrary evidence.

The Revolution in Colleges

The New York Times yesterday had an interesting piece, Top Universities Test the Online Appeal of Free. It is clear that the standard university model of expensive ivy-covered campuses, expensive tenured professors with frequent sabbaticals, and $40,000 to $60,000 per year student fees is rapidly becoming obsolete.  It will be interesting to see how this revolution plays out, but it will certainly be better for students, though it may end the cushy life styles of masses of overpaid university administrators and pampered professors.

Thus far these universities haven't figured out how to offer degrees online (at a much lower cost), but that will inevitably come, because if they don't, companies will begin accepting proof of course completion as equivalent to a degree, and colleges will be out of a job. If a bright, competent Indian or Chinese or Bangladesh student shows up in Silicon Valley having trained themselves online with these courses and can program like a wizard, who is going to care if she/he has a paper degree from a US college?

A missed opportunity

Much has been made of the apparent discovery announced last week of the Higg’s boson from CERN on the Swiss-France border.  Of course there are a lot of America scientists working at CERN, but the work is being done in Europe, not America; the center of this intellectual activity is in Europe, not America; the associated jobs are in Europe, not America; the bright young physicists who will make the discoveries of the next few decades are drawn to CERN in Europe, not America.

America could have hosted this discovery, and done so years ago, and been the center of this work. The Superconducting Super Collider, with more energy (20 TeV) then CERN’s (14 TeV) was being built in Texas until Congress in its short-sighted wisdom cancelled the project in 1993, even though almost 15 miles of the 54 mile tunnel had already been bored.

The estimated total cost of the Superconducting Super Collider had risen to about $12 billion, which seemed to Congress like a lot of money, though Congress apparently can, for example, justify paying farmers about $20 billion A YEAR in farm subsidies. And the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have already cost us something in the range of $3.4 trillion, or almost 300 times more than the Superconducting Super Collider would have cost us.

It makes one question the wisdom of Congress -- as if other events hadn’t already made us question their widsom.

Fossil Fuels

In all the talk about the election and the America economy, one issue seems to be under the radar. We used to worry about being dependent on foreign oil, and about fossil fuel running out -- this has been driving the green movement for years now and is what was behind President Obama's drive to fund green energy alternatives (a drive that has been less than successful - several of the efforts his administration funded have gone bankrupt).

But beneath the radar, a very profound thing has happened.  Technological advances, primarily "fracking" or hydraulic fracturing, has opened up truly vast new fossil energy sources in North America in the form of natural gas. We may quite soon cease to import much oil from anyone.

Opponents of fracking worry about all sorts of things, like contaminating underground aquifers (though most fracking takes place way, way deeper than any aquifers we use)  or causing earthquakes, but in fact the evidence thus far suggests these worries are overblown.  Burning natural gas still has global warming implications, but we know how to address that problem with efficiency improvements, business incentives and some other technological advances, if and when the nation can get its act together and actually implement them.

But this flood of new cheap energy promises to profoundly change the American economy, and change it for the better.  It will no doubt take a few years for the effects to be obvious, but it is truly a "game changer" that hasn't really been talked about much yet.

Obama's campaign

The country still has high unemployment, slow growth, a massive federal debt and a massive annual budget deficit, and states and cities in desperate financial straits, some even going bankrupt, and yet President Obama is apparent basing his campaign on attacking the work Mitt Romney used to do in the private sector more than a decade ago.

You might think the president would want to tell us his plans (he has some, surely) to reduce the federal deficit and federal debt, his plans (he has some, surely) to stimulate growth and new businesses, his plans (he has some, surely) to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear capability, his plans (he has some, surely ) for ....etc, etc.

Apparently he doesn't want to boast about ObamaCare (probably wise). Apparently he doesn't want to talk much about the bailouts, or the huge bonuses that some of of the bailed-out CEOs and traders got anyway (probably wise). Apparently he doesn't want to talk about the steps he has taken to prevent the banks from getting us into this sort of mess again (probably wise, because not much has really happened). Apparently he doesn't want to talk about his last campaign's promise to bring Washington together and work with the Republics (probably wise).

It is an interesting campaign, but it doesn't give me much confidence that the President will do any better for the nation in his second term than he did in his first term, or that he has any idea how to help the nation out of its current mess.

Corruption

One might be forgiven for believing that the world has gotten more corrupt recently. We have always suspected, often with good evidence, that politicians were corrupt, but in recent years we have found out that teachers and schools are corrupt (faking test results to make the school look better, and most recently, covering up sexual abuse to preserve the school's image), brokerage firms are corrupt (running some of the largest Ponzi schemes ever), and even banks, those institutions who embody and depend entirely upon trust, are corrupt (most recently tinkering with interbank loan rates to protect their own investments).

But are people really more corrupt than in the past, or is it just that the rapid news cycle of the internet has made the existing corruption more obvious? I suspect we as a nation are (a) no more corrupt than we have ever been, but (b) more corrupt in general throughout society than we would like to admit.  Like Victorians who were prudish about sex in public but pretty licentious in private, I suspect corruption, much it relatively minor but nevertheless corruption, exists at all levels, from the CEOs who arrange cozy deals with their boards to be overpaid through midlevel staff who pad their expense accounts to union workers who see to it that new members don’t hang more sheetrock per day than the union “limit”.

What is different about American corruption is that we seem to have found ways to be more “genteel” about it, so that it seems more socially acceptable.  Our politicians are less likely to accept cash in brown bags than to accept cushy jobs after they leave public service from companies whose contracts they controlled while in office. Our bankers are less likely to steal directly from customer accounts than to fiddle the books (or the rates) to cover their own trading losses. Our teachers are less likely to change test grades to make themselves look better than to simply teach to the test in the first place.

Contrast this with places like Afghanistan and Iraq, where billions of America (taxpayer) dollars have gone missing, some of it quite literally taken right off the backs of the trucks taking it to the banks (and why, one might well ask, is no one in the American government ever held accountable for this?).

Still, the scale of corruption exposed in recent years is worrying. For a society like ours that depends ultimately upon trade and commerce for its economic vitality, trust is essential and corruption at any level is ultimately a drag on the economy.  Considering the problems we now face in our economy, I guess we had better start paying more attention to the endemic corruption, genteel as it may be.

An interesting legal ruling

The law is most interesting when it deals with a difficult issue. A court in Cologne, Germany has ruled that male circumcision of small children is illegal, amounting to “bodily harm”. Jews and Muslims alike are appalled, of course, and are arguing that child circumcision is a fundamental part of their religion and culture. The issue isn’t about circumcision per se, but about performing the operation on a small child who cannot give permission.

 At first blush, of course, it sounds like a preposterous ruling. Jews in particular have circumcised their boys on the eight day for thousands of years now. Surely we cannot now forbid it.

BUT, if it is permissible to circumcise young babies on the eight day because it is an integral part of some group’s cultural and religious beliefs, why does the same logic not apply equally to the sort of female circumcision or genital mutilation practiced on young girls in parts of Africa as part of other cultures religious and cultural beliefs? We are all appalled at that, and there are active movements in the world to bring it to a halt – but what fundamentally is different about that than about male circumcision of male babies?

This is an interesting legal and moral question. To what extent do adults have the right to impose irreversible bodily changes on very young children simply because it is part of their religion or culture? And if it is impermissible for adults to impose bodily damage of this sort on young children on the basis of cultural or religious beliefs, what about imposing emotional and intellectual damage (fear of divine wrath, the concept of sin, hatred of other religions, etc, etc) on vulnerable young children? Should this be impermissible as well? If not, why not?

All in all this ruling raises very interesting questions that the world needs to think about.

Some startling numbers

Writing in the Huffington Post today, Marian Wright Edelman, the President of the Children's Defense Fund, quotes some startling numbers in her post Ending the Cradle to Prison Pipeline and Mass Incarceration -- the New American Jim Crow:

A black boy born in 2001 has a one in three chance of going to prison in his lifetime and a Latino boy a one in six chance of the same fate. The U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world: 7.1 million adult residents -- one in 33 -- are under some form of correctional supervision including prison, jail, probation, or parole. Michelle Alexander writes in her bestselling book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness that there are more adult African Americans under correctional control today than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began. In 2011, our state and federal prison population exceeded that of the top 35 European nations combined. Something’s very wrong with this picture.

Recommended: Honor Code

The Op Ed piece Honor Code, by David Brooks in the July 5 New York Times is well worth reading.  He points out that the steadily falling school achievement of boys relative to girls, not only in the USA but in most developed nations, is a reflection of an educational system that provides what is culturally "one size fits all" education, and he argues for more diversity in approaches.

Caifornia's High Speed Rail Initiative

Early in President Obama's tenure in the White House he pushed for a high-speed rail initiative in which the Federal Government (ie - we, the taxpayers) would provide seed money to states to build high-speed rail lines. As I argued some months ago in this blog, high speed rail is only economically viable in a very few high-density population areas, and even marginal there. Like supersonic airliners, high speed rail lines are sexy but require massive subsidies to build and maintain. Ohio, Wisconsin and Florida all declined to take federal seed money for high-speed rail systems, judging that it would saddle the state budgets in the long run with ruinous subsidies to keep such lines running.

Now the California legislature, by a very close vote, has approved $8 billion in funding to start building the first segment of a high speed rail line to eventually link Sacramento, San Fransisco and Los Angeles, a rail line whose eventual cost is currently estimated at about $68 billion (it was originally estimated at $45 billion).  Unions of course pushed hard for this project, hoping for more jobs.  But like most such projects, the true cost will no doubt double or triple again by the time it is built.

To make matters worse, the Federal government insisted that the first segment be built in California's central valley, the area with the lowest population density and therefor the smallest possible ridership, so there will be minimal income from this first segment. And once the federal seed money runs out in a few years, California will be left paying the full construction and maintenance costs.

The question is whether this is a bold move by the state to provide advanced infrastructure, or a stupid move in the face of a $16 billion deficit in the current state budget.  I suspect it will turn out to be the latter, leaving California eventually with a very expensive white elephant and an even deeper debt problem.