 |
| Professor Unger, the younger |
If history is one long argument, then science is not far behind. We do have certain accepted principles in most of science, but everything is always open to challenge, even the things, especially the things, we want to believe. And since science is the search for truth, we try to be careful to avoid the traps of politics and law, where the way people look and sound when they say something often becomes more important than the content of what they say--"the media is the message" thing.
So, when you take a look at Professor Unger as the buxom blond bomb shell, you start dreaming of the Saturday Night Live skit which could ensue.
Reading Nadine Unger's article in today's New York Times this morning, it was the content, not her physical attributes which was enough to make the Phantom spill his coffee all over the page.
 |
| Well, dark stuff absorbs heat |
After all, all you have to do is to look at the results of clear cutting of forests and you get a gut feeling that can't be good.
But what she says is: 1. Trees do suck carbon dioxide out of the air and pump back oxygen, but they often keep that oxygen right in the forest and so it is not just an oxygen producing pump for the rest of us to breathe. 2. Trees, being dark, suck up a lot of the sun's heat and so they tend to warm the surface of the planet, which is why the Northeast of the United States, which is the most densely tree covered part of the country, often heats up during the summer. 3. For reasons she does not explain, reforestation in the tropics might well help to cool the planet, but in the northern latitudes, apparently, her calculations suggest the loss of trees may actually cool the planet because those dark, heat absorbing trees are now replaced with lighter colored stuff. 4. Trees emit "volatile organic compounds" (VOC's) which mix with stuff coming out of cars and factories to create even more noxious chemicals in the atmosphere. So the worst place you can be, presumably, is on a road by a factory, surrounded by forests. 6. Trees do suck up CO2 but they also suck back some of the oxygen they make, so they are not just givers but takers. And when they die and fall to the forest floor and decompose, the CO2 contained in them goes back into the atmosphere.
Trees, then, from an atmospheric perspective are not the unalloyed good citizens of the earth, according to Professor Unger.
Of course, you know, reading along, there must be some reasons to doubt her hypothesis. Anyone who's ever walked through New York City in Mid-August, at dusk, anyone who has felt the heat radiating off those stone buildings, which have been cooking all day like bricks in an oven, knows that however much heat forests trap, the alternative to forests may trap even more.
The problem with all this is the New York Times has followed it's standard practice of publishing Ms. Unger's article without running a "counterpoint" article next to it. There are good commercial reasons for doing this: 1. "Oh, we don't have the space." Well, if you don't have the space for the response, why publish at all? 2. From an "impact" consideration, when you publish a controversial piece, it gets people riled up, creates buzz, sells papers, gets website hits. But if you publish the counterpoint right next to it, (as some medical publications do) the reader reads that and breathes a sigh of relief--"Oh, she might be wrong," and this defuses the outrage, and people turn the page saying, "Well, that's an interesting idea, but I don't buy it for all the reasons in the counterpoint," and they turn the page and read about the stupid thing John Boehner said.
 |
| Older and soon to be famous, now |
So, it's not Professor Unger's fault, her incendiary ideas have provided Fox News drill -baby-drill anchors with a day's source of fun and frolic. She is following the data, she will say. Her interpretation is doubtless challenged by other professors in her field, and it's not her job to provide the opposing argument. Well, actually, in science, you are supposed to say what you understand the weaknesses in your argument are, how you might be wrong and what studies could be done to resolve the doubts--science is not law. It's not about winning and losing but about seeking the truth.
Ms. Unger and the Times will argue they cannot control what is done with their ideas; they can only put the ideas out there and let the conversation take its course. On the part of the Times, of course, this is the definition of disingenuous, because they could have put the ideas out there in a form which contained the counter arguments as, inevitably, will appear in letters to the editor at a time when the audience for them will be a tenth the size of the audience which heard the original piece and only the most interested will hear it.
But the Times, any newspaper is not about seeking the truth. News reporting--apart from NPR and the News Hour--has always been about selling papers and grabbing attention. Headlines sell papers, reasoned discussion hasn't been seen in American newspapers since the Lincoln-Douglas debates were printed ver batum in the papers before the Civil War.
 |
| Can this really be good for the planet? |
The only thing wrong with publishing Dr. Unger's hypothesis is the sure knowledge that the Right will have a field day with it. A day, to be sure, but still, Rush and Sean and the whole crew of those Barbie Doll anchors and Ann Coulter will all be talking about this for months.
Unmentioned, will be Paul Krugman's piece from yesterday which reviews the data which show that if we switched away from fossil fuels, it would hurt the oil companies but it would help the economy with the jobs and profits from what replaces it--sun, wind industries. As he notes, the same people who are always arguing that capitalist systems are strong because they are so flexible, so eager to respond to the new and embrace it and make a profit, are the same people who say we cannot embrace new sources of energy because with need to protect the dinosaurs of oil (literally dinosaur based) from extinction. We watch happily as other industries (news media, stock brokers, book publishing, music recording) all change or vanish, but oh, we cannot have the coal miners or oil barons threatened by wind and solar competitors.
So, there you have it, science marches on, and it runs smack into politics, the yowling hyenas of Fox News and the great unwashed masses of Joe Sixpacks who are sitting in their bars gloating.
According to this bimbo, trees should be bursting into flames because of all the heat they absorb. Of course the reason they don't is because, through photosynthesis, the heat is converted into sugar.
ReplyDeleteI wish I had a dollar for every college graduate I've met who seems to have the IQ of a doorknob.
Her theory might work if trees were made of asphalt rather than being living organisms.
DeleteP.S. If our tax dollars are supporting her research, we all deserve a refund.
I was absolutely livid when I read Ms Unger's article. It seems she has not actually left her office and taken a walk through a forest. By the time she's done with her "science" all she might have to walk through is an industrial desert.
ReplyDeleteI suspect she'll be joining Fox News any time now.
DeleteNadine is probably correct in most of her points but what she really seems to be saying is that trees should be turned into 'biochar' (charcoal by another name) which if plowed into soil will remain unaltered for a thousand years..
ReplyDeleteHer point that if photosynthesis would stop atmospheric oxygen content would decrease by only one percent is truly mysterious. Perhaps she means that diatomic oxygen would somehow emerge from Earth's rocks.
By the way Nadine's primary appointment at Yale is with the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies a scool founded by the family of Gifford Pinchot, first chief of the USFS
Leslie B and Anon,
ReplyDeleteI'm always reluctant to react to findings of "science" which conflict with my own cherished beliefs, remembering those people Neil DeGrasse Tyson describes in the 13th century who were burned at the stake for suggesting the sun did not revolve around the earth.
On the other hand, science is a series of propositions, hypotheses and my real objection to this story was not so much that Dr. Unger thinks New England forests are heat sumps, while Amazon forests are okay, but what annoyed me was the absence of a response from opposing scientists who disagree, and there must be those.
If the New York Times is the last man standing in the world of "responsible journalism," then it ought to, as a rule, find a person to write a counterpoint and publish it alongside the original article. Letters to the editor or a sorry excuse for this sort of irresponsibility.
Phantom
I couldn't agree more.
DeleteYellow journalism is alive and well in the 21st century.
Phantom, Leslie B., Anons,
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that you would, before discussing the body of Professor Unger's article, opt to discuss the body of Professor Unger-notably her blonde hair and ample chest. Could this be in part what prompted Leslie B to refer to her as a "bimbo"? Not that you, Phantom, would ever insinuate that the color of a woman's hair or chest size would have an effect on her ability to formulate scientific theory. No, you apparently just wanted to point out the conclusions others might draw regarding the correlation between breast size and functioning brain cells..In this case, size does matter-thank you Phantom for alerting us to this potential pitfall..
As for Professor Unger-why the quick assumption she's wrong. She's not advocating the eradication of trees from the planet, in fact she states "planting trees and avoiding deforestation do offer unambiguous benefits.." Her point was reforestation may be an easy, relatively speaking, but not necessarily effective solution to climate change. Planting trees is a much simpler, straight forward solution than trying to navigate through the political and economic factors responsible for the vast majority of carbon dioxide production.
In a related piece in the Boston Globe today, the subject was the toll climate change was taking on Maine-the state with the highest percentage of forested land as well as coastal waters that are warming at a rate "99% faster than the world's other oceans". Perhaps Professor Unger and her VOC experiments are on to something. Maybe not.
Finally, although publishing a counter argument on the subject would be helpful to the public to more fully understand the complexities of climate change, it doesn't seem the paper's failure to do so rises to the level of irresponsibility or yellow journalism....
Maud
Go here: http://news.mongabay.com/2014/0922-scientists-respond-to-dont-plant-trees-oped.html
ReplyDeleteMs. Maud:
ReplyDeleteAs is so often the case, you notice something others often breeze by--the photo of the professor in question.
I did not mean to say because she is a big breasted blond she is a bimbo. Personally, I have known many big breasted blonds who are highly intelligent, serious people--Scandinavia is rife with BBB's. Ireland has its share, and you would miss a lot of intellectual talent excluding women BBB's from universities if you thought them all bimbos.
However, the Phantom has spent way more time in universities and on university faculties than was good for him and he has concludes some professors cause more of a splash than their work might justify, simply because of the way they present themselves. The very institution which should be blind to good looks is often not.
Having said all that, your more substantive point-- that it is far easier to simply focus on planting trees than to actually address what governments should be addressing--is a critical point. The feel good solution is so often a justification for not doing what should be done.
It is the Achilles heel of so many liberal solutions to societal problems--set up a program or give dollars to a program which places books in pediatricians' offices with instructions about reading to your children and you will solve the problem of inner city children who do not read.
My only disagreement with you is that failing to publish the counter point is irresponsible. It is irresponsible. We have simply got so accustomed to the lazy, irresponsible, financially driven sort of journalism which does not publish counterpoints, we simply accept this mode of operation as the standard.
Phantom
Nadine Unger is a well-repected scientist and great person who has devoted her life to climate research. Characterizing her in this way, posting photos of her like this, without knowing her, that is wrong. I encourage all of you to ask yourself what biases and assumptions her article evoked within yourselves, and the impact of being ignorant to your own biases.
ReplyDeleteYou can't get to be a professor at Yale unless you are incredibly smart in your field. That is a fact. Ok, it is possible that there are counter arguments to her view, of course. However, to write her view off in the way that you have, and many others have, that is more about YOU than about her. Until you go to school for years upon years, get a doctorate in Atmospheric Chemistry, and publish research articles, I'd rather not hear anymore of your commentary garbage.
Anon,
ReplyDeleteYour point is well taken. We ought to focus on the argument, rather than the person.
My main beef with this discussion is that Dr. Unger's argument was placed without rebuttal in the Times--which is no fault of Dr. Unger's.
On the other hand, the photo, found so readily on line, with all its Hollywood allure, one might argue, could be construed as an attempt--perhaps not on her part--to establish a personna which goes beyond the scholarly into the glamorous.
Having trained at Yale, I am said to report that you can, indeed, become a professor at Yale without being incredibly smart in your field. That, too, is a prejudice not founded in empirical evidence. Professor Unger should not be given any special credence because she speaks from the Yale pedestal. Her arguments must stand or fall based on the evidence she can present and the arguments which are brought to bear against them.
Others, in the comment section, have mentioned websites which have carried the counterpoints, convincingly, to my mind.
But you are correct, and that is my fault, the portrayal of her as a bimbo, if only by the expedient of running her chin down dewy blond photo, was not called for.
Phantom
Thank you for your response and apology. I respect your opinion and right to express it. I agree that the fact that she is a Yale Professor does not mean we shouldn't critically evaluate her statements. However, my point is that it is very interesting and somewhat disturbing to me how strongly the majority of people are reacting to her. She is being completely dismissed. She is not just a Yale Professor. She is an established research scientist that has published important publications that has significantly advanced her field. There must be something credible in her op-ed piece, and what is interesting to me is the resistance that so many are having to believing that.
ReplyDelete