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Dr Pachauri has recently announced that IPCC will not comply with conflict of interest guidelines that the IPCC itself has accepted. These are specifically to address the total lack of any rules on conflict, especially as it concerns upper level officials. He thinks it would be "unfair" to the conflicted authors. Never mind if it's fair to the world.
Dr. Pachauri demonstrates his abilities to defend on this video re: the Himalayan Glaciers...increased funding soon came the way of his interests, after the scare story was published in the IPCC report.
The Economist: I wondered if we could start off on the matter of the glaciers. When you first read the passages with the mistakes in?
Dr Pachauri: Well to be quite honest, I’ve gone through the entire IPCC report very quickly, but this particular thing never really came to my attention and it’s for this reason, despite the fact that I’ve been giving hundreds of talks all over the place over the last two and a half years or so, I’ve never used that figure. I’ve never ever mentioned that the Himalayan glaciers are going to melt by 2035.
To the claim that he had never noticed and it had not come to his attention: an interesting claim ! Is it true ?
I tend to be of the view that the article starts with:
Quote
PANELS of experts assessing scientific investigations tend to be messy affairs, particularly when their customers are governments. People with expertise in one field, such as renewable energy, may have a bias towards it. Summaries of their work are the result of political negotiations. And findings are further boiled down in an attempt to win media coverage.
All such reports should be viewed with skepticism, but as information is collated from many sources, a generalized view can be ascertained. At the same time, I am not one to automatically condemn anyone on the presumption that they are dishonest, or deliberately skewing results. Approaching with skepticism does not mean, for example, that the evidence is necessarily inaccurate, fraudulent, or biased, but it does mean that liberal application of salt should be used when assessing conclusions. The problem, of course, is when the underlying evidence cannot be independently verified, or when studies cannot be reproduced. The bias can also taint further studies when they rely on corrupted predecessors.
A well reasoned argument is like a diamond: impervious to corruption and crystal clear - and infinitely rarer.
Here, as elsewhere, people are outraged at what feels like a rigged game -- an economy that won't respond, a democracy that won't listen, and a financial sector that holds all the cards. - Robert Reich
It behooves the IPCC, as it does any scientific body, to adopt a policy rigorously scrubbing bias from its results, and ethical standards of conduct (especially conflict of interest rules). Of course, all conflicts do not necessarily equate to bias, but it undermines the credibility of any group that does not police itself vigorously.
A well reasoned argument is like a diamond: impervious to corruption and crystal clear - and infinitely rarer.
Here, as elsewhere, people are outraged at what feels like a rigged game -- an economy that won't respond, a democracy that won't listen, and a financial sector that holds all the cards. - Robert Reich
