The science isn't over. There are plenty of things we don't know.
But likewise there are things we do know. I know of no serious climate scientist who claims we understand the climate. But we still know that human activity is warming the globe at an unprecedented rate.
The fossil burning industry has been handed a gift not by scientists overreaching but by systematically discrediting solid science. This is no different than decades of subterfuge by tobacco to sow doubt about the health effects of smoking, and similar things with asbestos. Further
peoples "natural intelligence" being really really bad at dealing with uncertainty and slow multi generational global phenomena. If you predict something to happen with 90% chance, and it doesn't happen, people naturally tend to think you were wrong. Further, the language of careful uncertainty analysis has often been twisted by parties who are interested in maximizing the profit from their historical investments.
Of course you will find individual scientists who disagree over how certain or uncertain particular results are (and who are more alarmist than others), but please, since they seem to be so irritating to you, could you actually point out cases of this supposed overreach?
Because in all honesty it sounds to me like you're more irked by scientists also being advocates.
In which case you should ask yourself, if your research shows that there is a considerable risk (which is a criterion well short of scientific certainty) of dramatic negative consequences, what is your ethical obligation as a scientist in society? Is it sufficient to publish this result in an academic journal, or do you have an obligation to ring the alarm bells?
We're in agreement regarding the utter seriousness of global warming, glad to hear. I do believe the main tasks are: adapting to the changes that are coming, taking care of those of us that will get displaced (which may mean moving to a green Sahara), and making sure we don't further worsen the problem. But in light of the prospecting that takes place all over (for example in Greenland and other areas made exploitable by receding glaciers) I'm rather pessimistic about the last point. Even with the fairly rapid development of alternative energy sources (solar, wind, geothermal) it does not seem that these will replace fossil or nuclear fuels any time soon, only supplement it.
As for examples of overreach, I was amiss in not citing anything in support, but the comment was already too long. I'll cite one such example here which I believe supports my point: The so called 'Climategate' affair, which, while scientists involved were exonerated from any direct wrong-doing, revealed a team of distinguished scientists "so focused on winning the public-relations war that they exaggerate their certitude — and ultimately undermine their own cause" [0]
I'll skip your questions based on the straw-man reading if you don't mind.
No scientific misconduct. No fraud. But yes, concern over the public relations battle that scientists have been forced into. Would you rather scientists just concede that battle?
And again, they have been fighting that battle _without scientific misconduct_. There was no hiding of uncertainties, it's all there in the papers. There are very few fields of science where uncertainties are so well studied. The sentence in the NYT article you quote is simply not backed by the facts, and it is mistaking consensus for group-think.
Opposing requests for transparency (looking at raw code and data) is unfortunately all to common in science. The culture is shifting, but it's a result of things being generally messy. Often it takes considerable experience to reliably reach judgements on what the data/code outputs mean. And that's typically not well documented. I advocate for open science at my institute wherever I can. We're getting there.
One perfect example is the "hide the decline". Anyone with statistics training knows that "the decline" is perfectly consistent with the previous trend + fluctuations + data problems. It didn't challenge anything. It's also right there in the published papers. But of course if you want to put out press releases you can't assume your audience knows that, you need to communicate that fact. The part of the audience that understands that can read the papers just fine to figure out the details (they are not hard to read).
But likewise there are things we do know. I know of no serious climate scientist who claims we understand the climate. But we still know that human activity is warming the globe at an unprecedented rate.
The fossil burning industry has been handed a gift not by scientists overreaching but by systematically discrediting solid science. This is no different than decades of subterfuge by tobacco to sow doubt about the health effects of smoking, and similar things with asbestos. Further peoples "natural intelligence" being really really bad at dealing with uncertainty and slow multi generational global phenomena. If you predict something to happen with 90% chance, and it doesn't happen, people naturally tend to think you were wrong. Further, the language of careful uncertainty analysis has often been twisted by parties who are interested in maximizing the profit from their historical investments.
Of course you will find individual scientists who disagree over how certain or uncertain particular results are (and who are more alarmist than others), but please, since they seem to be so irritating to you, could you actually point out cases of this supposed overreach?
Because in all honesty it sounds to me like you're more irked by scientists also being advocates.
In which case you should ask yourself, if your research shows that there is a considerable risk (which is a criterion well short of scientific certainty) of dramatic negative consequences, what is your ethical obligation as a scientist in society? Is it sufficient to publish this result in an academic journal, or do you have an obligation to ring the alarm bells?