Kenneth P. Green

Much of our understanding of anthropogenic climate change, and much of the debate over climate science and climate policy is based on information generated via mathematical modeling. Rarely, if ever, do we see much discussion of empirical measurements of climate change; global average temperature and sea level are rare exceptions.

… The list of modeled components of climate-change discourse is endless and model output information dominates nearly every element of discourse about the climate.

… For those who believe that public policy—the enactment of rules and regulations that are, by their nature, coercive tools of governance—should be based on evidence of a calibre one might demand in a court of law to determine guilt or innocence of a crime, the almost complete reliance on model outputs is problematic. This is so because model outputs are not, in fact, empirical evidence of anything concrete in the physical world.

Image: Dan Cristian Pădureț @ Unsplash

Quick link to full report:

Models or Measures of Climate Change: Why Does It Matter?