Science Moves On, With Or Without Al Gore

One more for the global warming skeptics:

NASA satellite data from the years 2000 through 2011 show the Earth's atmosphere is allowing far more heat to be released into space than alarmist computer models have predicted, reports a new study in the peer-reviewed science journal Remote Sensing. The study indicates far less future global warming will occur than United Nations computer models have predicted, and supports prior studies indicating increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide trap far less heat than alarmists have claimed.

Study co-author Dr. Roy Spencer, a principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and U.S. Science Team Leader for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer flying on NASA's Aqua satellite, reports that real-world data from NASA's Terra satellite contradict multiple assumptions fed into alarmist computer models.

"The satellite observations suggest there is much more energy lost to space during and after warming than the climate models show," Spencer said in a July 26 University of Alabama press release. "There is a huge discrepancy between the data and the forecasts that is especially big over the oceans."

What does it mean?

The new findings are extremely important and should dramatically alter the global warming debate.

That implies that we are havng a debate, rather than a duel of theologies.

Comments

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Conveniently, Roy has been discounted as being in the pay of Big Oil for years. Expect a long like of ad hom from Joe Romm any minute.

[Ignatz]

--That implies that we are havng a debate, rather than a duel of theologies.--

What is the skeptic's theology?
I don't think pointing out how bad someone elses theology based science is constitutes a new church.
In fact wouldn't it be a bit of an oxymoron to have a skeptic's church?

[Melinda Romanoff]

I hate it when my data does that.

[Extraneus]

Isn't Dr. Roy Spencer the "Official Climatologist of the Rush Limbaugh Program"?

I'm not saying he's wrong, but he'll be hammered by biased people for being biased.

[DerHahn]

The article calls the pro-AGW crowd 'alarmists'?!?!?! WINNING!

[matt]

in today's mail I received a completely battered box addressed to Soylent in Afghanistan postmarked November 20, 2010.

It had been opened and re-sealed and someone had helped themselves to half a bag of candy. Our postal service at work.

[Dave (in MA)]

ZOMG, it's worse than we thought! The evil oilsucking repuke SUVs are warming SPACE!! It's SOLARSYSTEMAL WARMING!! 1!!ELEVENTY!11!

[Appalled]

Let's see. The polar bears aren't drowning. The models aren't working.

Can we just say the global warming issue has cooled, and drop this from the list of stuff we all must obsess about?

[Janet]

Oh no, Matt! Is that the second returned one? I only had one returned...a box mailed in Feb.l
Anyway...I hope I don't get some boxes returned this late. Unbelievable.

[Not_Bubarooni]

Hey wait a minute!

I thought this was settled science already? Wasn't the meme that the anti-AGW crowd was just anti-science? Will this now mean the pro-AGW crowd is anti-science?

Clearly we are going to need to increase federal outlays for additional reasearch, studies, committees, commissions, etc on the matter in order to get an answer.

[Comanche Voter]

You mean all that handwringing, hair pulling, shrieking angst about Greenhouse Gases was just --a bunch of hot air?

[matt]

I am going to wait patiently for Mr. Gore to explain it all to us.

The polar bear story, if in fact this researcher falsified results, is a harpoon in the whole AGW narrative.

I'll give you another insight. A significant percentage of those millions of solar modules being manufactured every year will fail in less than the 25 year expected lifetime. Some major users are reporting 5-7% failure rates after only 7 years. The hell of is that there are no test standards that measure 25 year lifetimes. All of the data is anecdotal.

[Porchlight]

matt,

What happens to all those failed solar modules? Those things have some crazy nasty envirohazard stuff in them, if I understand correctly.

[Ignatz]

--The polar bear story, if in fact this researcher falsified results, is a harpoon in the whole AGW narrative.--

It's another nail in the coffin but it was already well known that Polar Bear populations are in fact increasing even now, while Arctic sea ice levels remain relatively low.

[lyle]

Gee, it's almost like the AGW crowd has been just makin' shit up or something.

[Janet]

Here is a story of something that could be cut from the federal budget. Subsidizing a bike sharing program.
A great example of a good idea...but why in the world are tax dollars subsidizing this?

"The National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board last month approved a grant for $1.9 million in federal funds that could add 20 stations in Rockville and the Shady Grove area."

[bgates]

Can we just say the global warming issue has cooled, and drop this from the list of stuff we all must obsess about?

No, that's insufficient. We also have to make it clear to everyone that the frauds who swore on a stack of IPCC reports that the world would end if we didn't keep shoveling them money and acquiescing to their desire for greater power over our lives are no different than any witch doctor who wanted to be king of his prehistoric village since the idea of magic first occurred to mankind.

[sbw]

Brilliant phrasing, bgates. Mind if I steal it?

[Janet]

Ya figure James Cameron will allow the poor in South America to have electricity now?

Here he is dancing.

[Janet]

No electricity for you!

[cathyf]

If you read down to the bottom of the story about the polar bear researcher, he claims that his paper was about the effect of storms and enlarging areas of open water on polar bears. In other words, the effect of local weather changes on polar bears. It was Al Gore and the other alarmists who latched on to this as somehow actually proving that polar bears were being killed off, and being killed off by global warming.

[matt]

porch, mono & poly solar modules, which make up 85% of those produced contain silicon, some silver, copper wire glass, some plastic and sealant.

Thin film modules contain small amounts of cadmium in some cases as well as a few other materials considered of concern if one should be directly exposed.

Both types of module are typically sandwiched between glass and plastic, and so are not exposed to the elements or most human activity. They just sit there, except when they catch fire...

Fires are not very common, but they do happen.What they are finding in places like Germany is that when a building or home catches fire for other reasons, it is very unwise to douse the roof with water when significant DC current is being generated. This is what we in the industry call a "bad thing".

I am more than ever convinced that the management in the solar industry are the same caliber of people who brought us the pet rock.

[Appalled]

bgates:

There is a real world concern that is more important than the big dreamers/schemers at the UN. The EPA has relied upon the "science" based on the models to propose their CO2 regulations. If the models are very wrong, the science is very wrong, and the EPA has no appropriate basis for their regulations.

I'll yield now to Charlie, who has written about this...

[Melinda Romanoff]

Appalled-

Lisa Jackson has merely expropriated Edumacation's "Zero Tolerance" stamp and gotten busy with it.

See? That was easy!

[matt]

my thoughts on "we've got to save life as we know it". LUN

[Melinda Romanoff]

Very clear, matt, but it's missing something.

Like the full-throated hypocrisy.

[Melinda Romanoff]

not yours!

The Dems!

(did not come out well.)

[henry]

A bit of good news while we wait for the House: redistricting suit tossed out of Federal Court . I think there are more redistricting suits, but they are equally lame. WI recall elections one week from Tuesday.

[bgates]

Appalled, the EPA was one of the groups I had in mind when I wrote "desire for greater power over our lives".

sbw, steal away.

[Drew Lowell]

Oh, for Pete's sake. I'm new here, so I don't know if this is a typical posting, but are we really seriously discussing a "study" authored by Roy Spencer (creationist and career AGW Denialist) and promoted by the Heartland Institute? C'mon, folks, you've got the Google -- use it?

[henry]

Drew, you were predicted in the first comment. ; )

[Drew Lowell-Britt]

Speaking of the Google, is this you, Drew Lowell?

Drew Lowell-Britt Energy/Sustainability Analyst Location Greater Los Angeles Area Industry Environmental Services

If it is, that explains your little fact-free spam attack against the heretic Roy Spencer: We have to protect our phoney baloney jobs here, gentlemen!

[DrJ]

And a Pitzer grad! Now where have I heard of that school before?

[Jim,MtnViewCA,USA]

"are we really seriously discussing a "study" authored by Roy Spencer"
I think so.
The data comes from NASA, right? The actual data is not from this Heartland Institute thing-y.

[henry]

Org Studies major -- that's a whole basket of kumbaya anywhere, let alone at Pritzker.

[srp]

I think we need a Devil Stipulation. When someone employs ad hominem responses to arguments based on logic and evidence, we say "I stipulate that I am the Prince of Darkness, evil devourer of souls. Nevertheless, x, y, and z are still correct statements, as you can see for yourself if you observe the evidence and employ your reason."

Otherwise we get absurd responses like Mr. Lowell's, who would ignore Newton's laws because their author was a creationist.

[Al Gore]

I don't know how any of this helps my chakras.

[daddy]

This ADN story from 2 months back mentions the Economic consequences from the US Government's designation of 187,000 square miles -- an area larger than California -- as critical habitat for the bears, part of the recovery plan required by law for a species declared threatened or endangered:

Native groups sue feds over polar bear critical habitat
NORTH SLOPE: The financial burden could hit billions, they say.

The State of Alaska and also The Alaska Oil and Gas Association had sued over that habitat designation.

Also worth mentioning that earlier this month U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan (he of the Ted Stevens Trial) backed a finding by government scientists that global warming is threatening the survival of the polar bear.

[Jim_in_MO]

To Henry @7:16 PM (my time)

To follow up on your comment, it's entirely "unexpected" that he/she can weigh in with that opinion within the time frame of a normal working day, don't you think?

[Jim_in_MO]

Arrgh, I'm so slow.

[henry]

Jim, I grew up in MO. Note that several of our fellow JOMers found that guy's details in no time at all. Nobody with any sense moves fast in July in MO (Lou Brock excepted). I'll drink a Bud with you.

[PD]

Conveniently, Roy has been discounted as being in the pay of Big Oil for years.

Yet Algore can make $$$ from "green" technology, carbon exchanges, etc., which, coincidentally get a boost from the very alarmism he promotes. And that's just fine with the left.

[PD]

Oh, for Pete's sake. I'm new here, so I don't know if this is a typical posting, but are we really seriously discussing a "study" authored by Roy Spencer (creationist and career AGW Denialist)...

Since you're new here, you can be forgiven, once, for not realizing that the regulars here are unlikely to be convinced by your reason-, evidence-, and argument-free "refutation."

Try again, if you like.

[narciso]

He seems to have so much credibility:

iring Manager
Pitzer College

Educational Institution; Higher Education industry

August 2006 – May 2008 (1 year 10 months)

• Trained and supervised 6 team members including management and staff.
• Developed and implemented innovative advertising and promotional campaigns for employee recruitment.
• Scheduled and conducted all departmental interviews.
Assistant to the President
International Film Distribution Consultants

Entertainment industry

June 2007 – September 2007 (4 months)

•Completed multiple television and film acquisition and distribution deals for international film companies.
•Designed an informational guidebook for potential clients at the Toronto International Film Festival and Marketplace.

[Janet]

I don't know how any of this helps my chakras.

Posted by: Al Gore | July 28, 2011 at 09:05 PM

The root chakra honors the earth!!

[Anarchy in the VA!]

• Trained and supervised 6 team members including management and staff.

Dazzled interns and college dropouts with tales of his fifth-rate Abbie Hoffmann hijinks.

• Developed and implemented innovative advertising and promotional campaigns for employee recruitment.

Typed form to place "Volunteer Opportunities" ad in the Daily Worker. Realized he was unqualified for his own job.

• Scheduled and conducted all departmental interviews.

Bullshit for hours on office telephone with local hack reporters about how he too was "making a difference, man".

It's ANARCHY baby! Now where's my gubmint paycheck?

[Soylent Red]

Obama is a Root Chakra.

[Drew Lowell-Britt]

Sorry, guys, I'm too busy spamming my ad hominem slanders at various sites to actually address any of these pesky facts that undermine my belief system.

http://reddogreport.com/2011/07/nasa-data-blows-gaping-holes-in-global-warming-hysteria/#comment-8553

http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/comment/76554/

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2011/07/ten-year-nasa-study-there-is-no-global.html?showComment=1311892010486#c2596576367668871042

etc. (you've got the Google -- use it!)

I have to protect my phoney baloney "Energy/Sustainability Analyst" job here, gentlemen!

[Minimalist Poster]

Of course we ignore Newton's Laws. They're designed to hold the workers down.

[Melinda Romanoff]

Pesky facts?

They certainly seem to cause problems in other arguments. Not here obviously. Your news worm certainly got you here in a prompt fashion. Defensive habits, or just narcissistic? Certainly not curious in physics.

But physics is a settled science, as we all know.

Do I get a grant now, or later? It's just government money.

[daddy]

"(you've got the Google -- use it!)"

Steve Jones tells the BBC: don't give 'denialists' so much air-time:

"In his report for the BBC Trust, Steve Jones actually attacks the BBC for having too little global-warming bias."

Can Prof Rajendra Pachauri really survive 'Glaciergate’?

"The head of the UN panel on climate change, Prof Rajendra Pachauri, is still adamant that one famously exaggerated report should not cost him his job."

[Melinda Romanoff]

daddy-

We need to go into the LEEDS certification scam. Between my trading and your global footprint, we ought to be able to scam qualify for awesome carbon credits.

Call me.

[Janet]

C'mon, folks, you've got the Google -- use it?

I can assure you that I do NOT have the Google. Now algore might have the Google...with all his masseuse hook ups the probability is high.

[Melinda Romanoff]

How "unique" is it that Drew Lowell-Britt keeps a scrip to search for his own name?

I should be humbled to be allowed to refer to Drew Lowell-Brit.

I'm just honored to be in his presence.

Deeply.

Honored.

[Melinda Romanoff]

And I can't spell things twice, my apologies.

[daddy]

Let's all do it Melinda!

LEED Certification & Training.

[Captain Hate]

Hey daddy, your Holes have a chance to be good at football now that Botch Davis is gone. Of course they'll have to get off suspension and whatever punishment the NCAA deals out. And the Holes will also have to get a new AD to pretend to have a "full commitment" to the football program. Kind of like Duke. I gotta hand it to Botch; it takes a special person to flagrantly cheat and still have a sub-.500 record in the ACC.

I don't think I've seen the NC State Scout board this happy for years.

[narciso]

"It's a Gift' Captain, is every institution, either incompetent or corrupt.

[daddy]

Bah Captain Hate. Reading and writing and 'rithmatic is overrated.

Off to explore typhoons betwixt Penang and Taipei. Later.

[narciso]

take care, daddy,

[Agent J. (formally known as "J"..]

daddy remember you fly around them, not over them.

[MoodyBlu]

CH:
I don't think I've seen the NC State Scout board this happy for years.

Same for the Va Tech sports board. Those Zima drinking UNCheaters (excluding daddy)are disliked in Blacksburg as much as the boys and girls from Charlottesville.

My brother, VT quarterback from 78-81

http://home.comcast.net/~atckz/Steve_Casey.jpg>

[DrJ]

Melinda,

Do I get a grant now, or later? It's just government money.

I know this comment is meant in jest, but do you really know how hard it is to get a government grant? Yes, I have some sensitivities because so many assume that it is simple. It is *hard* and it takes a lot of work. For me it is well over 300 hours per application.

I'll spare you the details, but in my field, at the moment, the funding rate is one for every ten or eleven that is submitted.

It is not an easy way to make a living, or to justify the return on investment.

But by all means go for it if you think this is easy money.

[Strawman Cometh]

vincente fox sazs:
ameirca iz going bust
cuz dey dont think about the future

[vincente foxamundo]

Montana is violating human right s every day

[some brit tool]

Alot of people are going to e reacting to what ou are saying

[vincete fox]

how can you separate a mother from his child?
Who is going to pay for them?

[My hero]

I have to have something that transcends election cycles

[srp]

Dr. J:

Does it seem like a good way to run the R&D railroad to have investigators spending so much time writing grants (instead of say, doing research or supervising research)? I seem to recall that the grant proposal for Brookhaven was under ten pages, but the things have gotten incredibly detailed over time.

Also, I've read many researchers report that it's standard practice to fudge these proposals by promising to do research that's actually already been completed, while actually applying the grant money to new projects not fully described. This behavior is allegedly more or less compelled by the way the reviewing panels work, in that they don't like to award grants for experiments that might not "work" or that seem speculative. That seems completely nuts to me, and I can't see why reviewers, who are supposedly researchers themselves, would perpetuate the fiction that research is about generating predictable results on schedule.

Princeton University's engineering school just got a donation from an alumna to allow for actual innovative research, see LUN. Sad that it takes special funds to do what should be SOP.

[jimmyk]

That seems completely nuts to me

I'm not so sure. If the goal is good research, the prospect of a reward (in the form of more money for new research) for research already done is just as effective an incentive as a grant for prospective work. In my area, most universities will support the work of unestablished researchers to give them a chance to do their initial work.

Also, in my experience the truth is somewhere in between. You have to be far enough along that the project has some credibility, but not already finished.

[sbw]

Dr. J., what you do is special. But we need to be able to parse the difference between grants the government might justify as within its purview and the other grants that are bureaucratic empire-building.

[Danube of Thought]

So Drew, babe. You're new here, right?

How do you like us so far?

[Danube of Thought]

You can't make this stuff up:

"Drew Lowell-Britt joined EcoMotion in 2008 with his passion for energy efficiency and green living. Accredited by the U.S. Green Building Council as a LEED Green Associate, Drew has the field experience working with residents and businesses to promote smart energy management and green construction. As a project coordinator for the Solar Santa Monica program Drew specializes in field services - energy and water efficiency, solar strategy, construction, and community outreach. Drew also provides technical solar support to EcoMotion's municipal utility clients Anaheim Public Utilities and Burbank Water & Power. Drew graduated with a B.A. in Organizational Studies from Pitzer College, a member of the Claremont Colleges, and now resides in Santa Monica. Residents may notice Drew doing his part to reduce his carbon footprint by biking to and from local appointments."

[jimmyk]

Beating DoT to the punch...

Unexpected

From the WSJ:

The U.S. economy expanded at a slower pace than expected in the spring as consumers cut back on spending, while revisions showed the slowdown since the beginning of the year was much more drastic than previously thought.

[Rick Ballard]

Sorry, jimmy, DoT was in at 8:52 on another thread. Bloomberg's consensus of 84 economists was 1.8%. I want a grant to study whether economists follow the same diet as climate scientists.

AP is running propaganda that stock futures are slipping due to the Tea Party activity in the House. Briefing.com tells a different tale, showing a very sharp break upon release of what are truly miserable GDP numbers.

[DrJ]

srp,

Does it seem like a good way to run the R&D railroad to have investigators spending so much time writing grants?

Practically I know of no other way. Grant are extremely competitive, and the amount of time I cite is what it takes me to write a competitive proposal. My situation is unique in a few ways that makes the time investment higher.

Most Universities and companies have support staff that makes proposal submission a lot easier and less time consuming. I have to do all of that myself. I also include a lot of consultants and subawardees because I need them to do the work proposed. Those all come from outside the company, and that takes a lot of time to get all the right paperwork in place. Most Universities and companies have these resources in house, and that makes it a lot simpler.

It might seem that to win one proposal that I spend 3000 hours per year writing. That's not so. I usually submit one or two per year, and my success rate is about 50%. Rather than submit more often, actually I have scaled way back in submissions, but make sure that the ones that I do submit are really good.

I disagree with the implication that proposal writing is a waste of time. I always find it remarkable how much I learn when I'm forced critically to evaluate what I've done, to set into words how I would perform an extended research project and compare it with who's done what, what the pitfalls might be and what backup plans are, and craft a story line that can sell. It does help the research substantially.

[DrJ]

srp,

I seem to recall that the grant proposal for Brookhaven was under ten pages, but the things have gotten incredibly detailed over time.

I've found that it is much more difficult to write (and also to review!) a short proposal than a longer one. NIH has reduced the page limit in many applications to 7 pages from 15, and in others to 15 from 25. The one I'm working on now would last two to three years, and have a budget of $700K. I have seven pages to describe the idea, the field and what has been done, show preliminary data, and describe (with quantifiable milestones) what I intend to do.

That has to fit in seven pages, with all of the figures, pictures and graphs. That is very hard. (This page count does not include the boilerplate, so the total proposal will still be in the 80 to 100 page range).

[DrJ]

srp,

I've read many researchers report that it's standard practice to fudge these proposals by promising to do research that's actually already been completed.

I'm sure it happens for some of the awards that are of shorter duration. For an award that would last three to five years there's simply no way to have it all done already and not have it published.

More common I'd think is for the six month to one year awards in staged grant programs to do the work in the six to nine months that it takes a proposal to course through review and funding. Most agencies allow for a six month claw-back to cover these monies, though if you don't get the award, those costs are not covered.

Even more common is to submit a proposal seeking to do something, and have it not work the way you thought. The work often takes you in a very different direction, and you wind up doing many activities that were not in the grant at all. That's considered fine. Grants do not have deliverables, and it is understood that research is not easy to predict. That doesn't mean you can use the grant monies directly to roof your house, though.

I can't see why reviewers, who are supposedly researchers themselves, would perpetuate the fiction that research is about generating predictable results on schedule

Some can indeed be rather conservative. I've heard the joke that you can't propose to climb a ladder unless you already have experience climbing ladders. So if you want to do that, you add a consultant who knows how to climb ladders. That's just grantsmanship. Usually though a bad response from the panel is an indication that you don't tell the right story, have the range of expertise and resources necessary to do what you propose, or have made an error or have overlooked important work that conflicts with what you are proposing. Often these simply have muddled thinking.

Review panels certainly are not perfect, but overall I think they do a pretty good job. The good proposals get funded and the bad ones don't. The ones on the border are where the disagreements happen. These days, when funding rates are so very low, that does not happen often.

[jimmyk]

Sorry, jimmy, DoT was in at 8:52 on another thread.

Drat! I knew I'd jinx myself with that.

These numbers (including the revisions) are basically within the margin of error of recessionary.

[DrJ]

sbw,

Dr. J., what you do is special.

Thanks, but it really is pretty mainstream health-related work (as is YL's BTW). But your point is right: the best way to tackle the federal grant thicket is to decide what is important, and then prune the rest programatically. Janet's example yesterday of grants for bicycles at certain Metro stops is a good one. There is no reason the Feds should do this. If a locale wants to do so, then let them fund it, either privately or from their own tax receipts.

[DrJ]

Sorry all for cluttering the thread. I do respond very negatively to many who think the feds will fund any hair-brained idea, that it is easy, and that they are so very lucrative. That's just not so.

[Melinda Romanoff]

DrJ-

My sole point was to highlight corrupt DC practices, ala Chicago style "vital research for the EPA" that gets slopped around if you make the right phone call, followed up with a check. The exposure of LEEDS as an efficiency measure scam a couple of months ago was my target, that with the carbon credit scheme. I do pick my words specifically, as you know.

The hard sciences, where you toil, is much harder to corrupt, but some are corrupted from within for a reason.

[DrJ]

Mel,

The hard sciences, where you toil, is much harder to corrupt

Yeah. I think I'm in the wrong business.

[Jim Miller]

Actually, DrJ, I would much rather read your explanations, even if they are off topic, than 99 percent of the comments here.

Why? Because I learned something from them.

[jimmyk]

I do respond very negatively to many who think the feds will fund any hair-brained idea, that it is easy, and that they are so very lucrative. That's just not so.

The problem is that there are two tracks. There's the real scientific research (NSF, NIH, etc.), which is hard to get grants for, as DrJ says. Then there's a separate gravy train for all sorts of nonsense funded by the fluffier departments like Education, HHS, and agencies like the EPA, NEH/NEA. The latter gives the former a bad name.

[DrJ]

jimmyk, those are the places where decision have to be made whether they are worth it or not. I do note that the technical areas of EPA are very competitive too, as is the case at the USDA (I work with a lot of the food science and viticulture/enology Profs at UC Davis, and they struggle).

One thing that has exacerbated the funding problems is that NIH had its funding doubled over seven years (I think) some years ago. The Universities responded by staffing up, erecting new building, forming centers and institutes, hoping/expecting to get on the gravy train.

At the end of the fund doubling, budgets have been flat for years. All of those buildings and people still have to be paid for, and there is a glut of PhDs who can't find work (the perpetual post doc).

This increasing demand for a fixed-sized pot has caused funding rates to plummet. They are under half what they were even a decade ago.

The stimulus funding also has screwed things up. Those grants are winding down, so there is another glut of people who had projects funded from the stimulus that are once again looking for funding. That too is driving down funding rates.

In my opinion, the research community would be served much better if these sorts of booms and busts were avoided. A steady growth would be a lot healthier for all involved.

[DrJ]

Thanks, Jim! I never know whether all of this arcane grant stuff is of interest to anyone.

[Melinda Romanoff]

DrJ-

Always.

[Manuel Transmission]

DrJ,

I feel lucky to have a $3.75m/3yr proposal in a 2.5 page format. A bit special in that it's sole source and the customer already know I've saved him $Ms, if not $Bs.

[DrJ]

MT,

I'd bet your proposal does not have to go through the peer review process, and that you can negotiate the price and deliverables. I'd also guess this is a contract and not a grant. Right?

BTW, I know of this small research lab that is very willing to do contract analytical and surface chemistry work. You know, to spread the wealth around...

[Jim Miller]

DrJ - Actually, I wrote about the subject back in 2008. In a post noting that the Bush administration had sharply increased spending on research, I criticized them for putting too much, too fast, into the NIH.

(Here's the post, if you are curious.)

[DrJ]

Jim, I agree (obviously!) that the funding ramp was too rapid. I did read your article, and generally agree.

You may be amused to learn that NSF had been scheduled to have its funding doubled over the next seven years. The initial increase was pared way back, from a requested $700 million increase to about $50 million.

Funding at NSF is small when compared with NIH ($30 billion vs $7 billion per year), so I don't think it would have the same distorting effect that the NIH bubble had.

And these days it probably won't happen anyway.

[rse]

Dr J-

As we have talked about before, the problem at NSF is at EHR which funds bad science to push social science.

I am concerned with John Holdren being over so many federal science agencies. "What would Ehrlich fund?" should have no place in who gets grants.

[For how long, nobody knows.]

We are cooling, folks.
======================

[rse]

Kim-

There is no longer any question that telling my story will set out the troubling foundations of yours as well.

Economic illiterates who think Utopia is a valid game plan. Let's raise a metaphorical glass to the defeat of the totalitarian schemers.

Cheers.

[And in whatever there is to the 'direction', education and climate are strongly linked. We may still have lost a generation.]

Interestingly, the question of whether this extraordinary popular climate delusion and madness of the crowd arose spontaneously or under direction is very difficult to answer. I'm inclined to choose 'both'.
=====================================

[Manuel Transmission]

DrJ,

Right on all counts. I've avoided the grant game throughout my career, with the only exception (or close to it) being an SBIR a couple of decades ago. That one actually was worth the effort partly because it was before the hustlers got into the game.

[srp]

Thanks for all the grant-getting feedback from Dr.J and company. Voters and taxpayers need to understand this type of sausage-making as much as they do how laws and regulations get made or how judicial decisions are reached--in some ways, research funding decisions affect us more than those do, if only in a long-run, cumulative fashion.

On shorter proposals: The point I was making was not about page limits per se but about the level of detail expected in a proposal. Accountability and planning are fine things, but they have diminishing marginal returns like most things, and I suspect we are well past the optimum in many areas. Defense procurement documentation, environmental impact reports, ISO checklists, etc. usually go unread and are often fanciful charades. Tons of useless verbiage, charts, and graphs are generated,
obscuring rather than illuminating the issues and bogging down progress.

On proposing things already accomplished: I had assumed that the practice wasn't totally blatant and that new stuff would still get done under a grant. But I've heard academic scientists describe what was almost a ladder-CD strategy for getting one grant after another by making each one promise results already obtained, whle using these previous "called shots" to bolster their credibility on the latest application. They lived in fear of not getting good results at any time because then the chain would be broken and they would lose their funding at renewal time, requiring them to shed people and lab space and starting a downward spiral from which they likely would not recover. It is precisely the competitiveness of the process that drives these fears.

[cathyf]

It's hard to believe that anyone would try to rely on a "cd ladder" approach to grants, because it's not directly the lack of good results that blows the scheme up, but simply getting denied. While your chances to getting denied are very high if you don't get results, the chances of getting denied are almost as high when you DO have good results. The grant funding percentages are down in the single digits -- it's more like winning the lottery than pay-for-results.

[Jim_in_MO]

cathyf,

If you feel so inclined, would you please tell me what a "cd ladder" is? I haven't heard that term/phrase until now. Seriously.

TYIA.