Category Archives: The philosophy of science

The origins debate

Posted on March 13, 2023 by ...and Then There's Physics

I’ve mostly tried to avoid the Covid origins debate, but I listened to a very good Guruspod episode, where they covered this. It was an interview with Eddie Holmes, Kristian Andersen, and Michael Worobey, and was partly intended as a … Continue reading →

Posted in Scientists, The philosophy of science, The scientific method | Tagged , , , , , | 494 Comments

Escape from model land

Posted on February 17, 2023 by ...and Then There's Physics

I listened to an interesting podcast that some of the regulars may find interesting. It was on the Volts podcast and was on the abuse (and proper use) of climate models. It is an interview with Erica Thompson, who has … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate change, Research, The philosophy of science, The scientific method | Tagged , , , , | 25 Comments

Climate science as a social process

Posted on February 5, 2023 by ...and Then There's Physics

I came across a paper that might be of interest to regular readers of this blog. It’s by Hans von Storch and is a Brief communication: Climate science as a social process – history, climatic determinism, Mertonian norms and post-normality. … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate change, physicists, Research, Resilience, Scientists, The philosophy of science, The scientific method, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | 74 Comments

The role of mathematical modelling

Posted on September 18, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

Christina Pagel and Kit Yates have an article in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) on the Role of mathematical modelling in future pandemic response policy. It’s part of a series in the BMJ on the UK’s covid-19 inquiry. I have … Continue reading →

Posted in Research, Scientists, The philosophy of science, The scientific method, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 203 Comments

The ‘hot model’ problem

Posted on June 10, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

Zeke Hausfather and colleagues recently wrote a Nature comment with suggestions about how to deal with what is called the ‘hot model’ problem. The issue is that some of the latest group of climate models have somewhat higher than expected … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate change, Gavin Schmidt, Global warming, Research, The philosophy of science | Tagged , , , , | 208 Comments

The science-society interface

Posted on May 8, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

I came across an interesting paper by Dietram Scheufele on Thirty Years of science-society interfaces: What’s next, which focusses mostly on science communication. Although – as the article mentions – this isn’t the only possible science-society interface. Since I have … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate change, Philosophy for Bloggers, Scientists, The philosophy of science, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | 121 Comments

Scenarios

Posted on April 9, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

Just before the release of the IPCC’s AR6 WGIII report (Mitigation of Climate Change) Joeri Rogelj had a Carbon Brief guest post on how not to interpret the emission scenarios in the IPCC report. It might have been to try … Continue reading →

Posted in ClimateBall, Philosophy for Bloggers, Policy, The philosophy of science | Tagged , , , , | 39 Comments

Moral models

Posted on February 28, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

I thought I would highlight a recent video presentation by Eric Winsberg, called Moral Models, Crucial Decisions in the Age of Computer Simulations. Some may remember that Eric co-wrote a post here about extreme weather event attribution. The theme of … Continue reading →

Posted in ethics, Policy, Scientists, The philosophy of science | Tagged , , , , | 19 Comments

The tragedy of climate change science?

Posted on January 16, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

Since my last post was about how scientists failed the pandemic test, I thought I might comment on another paper highlighting the tragedy of climate change science. The basic premise of the article is that society has failed to take … Continue reading →

Posted in Carbon tax, Climate change, Research, Scientists, The philosophy of science | Tagged , , , | 129 Comments

How scientists failed the pandemic test

Posted on January 14, 2022 by ...and Then There's Physics

Philip Ball has an interesting article about UK science advice called [q]uiet, uncritical, obedient: how the UK’s scientists failed the pandemic test. It make some good points about there appearing to have been collusion between the science advisors and the … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate change, Policy, Science, Scientists, The philosophy of science, The scientific method | Tagged , , , , | 57 Comments