Nobel Prize award and Clinton highlight importance of climate science 15

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1. 

   LandMan Posted 8:06 am
   16 Oct 2007

   Unduly?I wonder why she prefaced it with "unduly interfere"? Why not just say political appointees WON'T interfere, as in not at all.
   
   Land_Man

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2. 

   Biodiversivist Posted 2:45 pm
   16 Oct 2007

   There is no bigger joke on the face of this planetthan Rush Limbaugh.
   
   In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

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3. 

   charlesjustice Posted 5:44 pm
   16 Oct 2007

   Mars vs EarthIt's no mystery why Bush is pushing a mission to Mars.  Fat contracts for the aerospace industry is why.  Learning more about the Earth from space would be a lot cheaper, but it wouldn't put as much money in the pockets of the "defense" industry.

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4. 

   Backcut Posted 10:35 pm
   16 Oct 2007

   Donato's study?Would she expose pseudo science like the scam that Donato played on the gullible....... oops...."respected" scientific community? Has "peer review" just become another "driveby shooting" for stuck-in-the-office academians?? Why was it so obvious to me, a college dropout, that Donato's Deception was clearly a scam, when PHD's blindly jumped on-board??!? (Maybe it's because I go out in the woods and actually practice observation and scientific method myself.)
   Amazingly, preservationsists STILL use his study to convert the masses to their faith-based "covenants".
   
   Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com

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5. 

   atreyger Posted 1:36 am
   17 Oct 2007

   Backcut,The observations by Donald Donato were about as legitimate as they come. If you bring in equipment and people for salvage logging, natural regeneration will suffer. There's not much arguing about that. The spin is up to the people that want to use it to their advantage. I mean, if you only need 300 trees per acre within 50 years (not sure what the stocking guides are out West), does it matter if 3000 seedlings die, yet there's another thousand left?

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6. 

   Biodiversivist Posted 1:46 am
   17 Oct 2007

   BackcutYou inadvertently make a good point. Scientists always disagree and science is not a majority win game. Darwin would have lost had a vote been taken at the time of publication. And truth be told, a politician will always choose the most politically expedient of two options, science be damned. Clinton will support corn ethanol until it looks like doing so is poltically suboptimal. She's a politician, but at least, unlike Bush, she buys the theory of evolution.
   That study was not a deception. It was just a study, one of many that suggest that the  negative impacts of salvage logging have to be weighed against the positive.
   Everybody wants to save the biodiversity, they just disagree on how to best do it. You need to publish your own study. That is what the scientific method is designed to circumvent--personal observations. The fact that you butter your bread by cutting trees is a mark you would have to overcome with a really good, independently verifiable study. Bias is ubiquitous, subconscious and invisible to the owner (and we are all owners).
   
   In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

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7. 

   blueberrysushi Posted 3:22 am
   17 Oct 2007

   BackcutWhat exactly was wrong with Donato's study? It was very straightforward: before and after measurements of regeneration and fuel loading (here, woody debris). His data were analyzed by three independent statisticians. One peer reviewer of the article has come forward - Jerry Franklin; perhaps you don't like him, but he has hundreds of articles and, having spent some time in the woods with him, not an "armchair academic."
   The ridiculous part of the entire debacle was that scientists at Dan Donato's school (OSU) and the FS in Oregon tried to "correct" it by writing to the journal and trying to get publication delayed. This is not, in any way, the method to deal with scientific disagreement. In the end, they had to settle for a (peer-reviewed) letter in Science that was much less strongly worded than their original. It had to be pared down because so many of their arguments were spurious.
   If you would like to debate this topic further, we should start a thread on it. You can certainly claim that the conclusions of Donato et al. were faulty or overstated, but to call it the "Donato Deception" (capitalized!) is ridiculous.

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8. 

   blueberrysushi Posted 3:25 am
   17 Oct 2007

   Backcut IIOne final point, because the Donato et al. mess really gets my goat. How was Donato playing some sort of sinister trick on a "gullible" scientific community? Are you seriously claiming that Science, arguably the top journal in the world, was hoodwinked, and by an MS student?
   Jeezus. I suppose you think that the Sessions Report was the height of scientific authority for the salvage of the Biscuit fire. Let's see - rotting logs lose economic value over time. So let's bypass NEPA and log them more quickly!
   Excellent. Excellent.

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9. 

   Backcut Posted 2:01 pm
   17 Oct 2007

   Details about the Donato studyFirst of all, the meager amount of plots Donato sampled were miniscule compared to the acreage that was salvaged (which was also miniscule to the amount of total acres within the Biscuit--- 4%). Applying that small sample size to the whole of the National Forest and BLM system of lands is the epitome of pseudo-science.
   The title of the study (Post-Wildfire Logging Hinders Regeneration and Increases Fire Risk) alone makes assumptions, then conclusions and then extrapolations that just aren't true. I have photographic evidence of both tractor and helicopter units that were salvaged and are truly better off for having fuel loads reduced (as well as looking "park-like"). Indeed, some pictures show little evidence of ANY logging just 8 months after the project was finished.
   Of course, much of the impacts depend on a host of conditions that affect what the ground will look like when they've finished salvage logging. This link details some of the serious statistical errors made by Donato.
   http://www.evergreenmagazine.com/mag_issues.html
   Of course, Science Magazine didn't publish the little bit about his plots having stocking levels that actually met Federal stocking standards, either. Ahhh, yes. Minor details??!? Did he mention that leaving all that fuel out in the woods will undoubtedly fuel the next inevitable catastrophic fire??!? Nooooooooooo! Did he mention that the salvaged parts of the previous "Silver Fire" burned with much less intensity than the other parts of the Biscuit??!? Nooooooooo! Did he mention that those unsalvaged snags would eventually fall and crush those poor baby trees?!?? Nooooooooo!
   Being a fire salvage expert, yes, I have seen bad logging jobs that do unnecessarily disturb soils and leave lots of slash. However, the Biscuit salvage sales only cut completely dead trees and their logging slash was used to help prevent and mitigate erosion problems. Many of today's modern salvage projects remove most of the logging slash by "whole-tree yarding" and either chipping or piling and burning the slash at the landing. I also have pictures of helicopter landings where they flew out unmerchantable materials for piling and burning. Did the Forest Service do a great job of salvaging the Biscuit? Certainly not! Did they do an acceptable job of salvaging? Considering the meddling from the Bush Administration and their friends, yes, I tend to think so. Personally, I would have also salvaged dying trees along with the completely dead ones but...
   In truth, sometimes ground disturbance actually INCREASE the amounts of successful germinations in the more lightly burned areas. Removing fuels is important to decrease future fires intensity, which is what kills trees and wildlife.
   How many of those peer reviewers actually were in the Biscuit cutting units and look at his plot selections??!? Probably a big fat ZERO! Yes, I've been in a few dozens of those units before the cutting began, so I have seen the land firsthand.
   Donato had to be completely oblivious to not know he was being manipulated by all parties. Columbia Helicopters thought they were getting a study that would prove that salvage logging was beneficial. His teachers seized the opportunity to grab some desperately needed funding for their school, as well as taking a poke at the Bush Administration and Sessions (maybe deserved, in this context but...). Science Magazine "cherry-picked" the stuff in his report that would support their biased views, regardless of how they'd like to be perceived as "warriors of pure science". Eco-groups are still using the flawed study to further their no-cut "Quixotic" pursuits. Desk-bound academians jumped on the bandwagon without firsthand site visits and relished in their roles without any thought to "integrity".
   Now, to put my attitude into perspective, I consider myself to be a "true environmentalist", doing what is right for each piece of ground, whether it means cutting trees, prescribed fire, protection of endangered species or wildland urban interface protection. I'm definitely NOT a friend of the lumber mills!
   I'm all for using sound science to actively manage our lands instead of "letting nature take its course". Mother Nature will surely balance unnatural ecosystems in ways we humans won't like, as she works on different timescales than we do. Open your minds, think globally and act locally, and please don't punish me for the sins of previous foresters and evil log buyers. Yes, old growth is precious to me, as well.  
   
   Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com

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10. 

    Backcut Posted 10:08 pm
    18 Oct 2007

    HmmmThe silence is deafening!!
    
    Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com

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11. 

    Biodiversivist Posted 11:28 pm
    18 Oct 2007

    Silence usually means you made your point.It was just a study. It made news becuase the boneheads wrote a letter to Science asking them to pull it. That was the real mistake. The editor at at Science talked about another example where that happened. Some fusion researchers wrote a letter to Science asking them not to print a paper on fusion being caused by imploding bubbles. A year later the fusion was confirmed.
    Also, a parklike forest is not necessarily a healthy forest.
    
    In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

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12. 

    atreyger Posted 3:19 am
    19 Oct 2007

    BackcutThe thing is, I don't disagree with you at all, you are right about the hoopla surrounding the study.
    But the study itself, ahem, is fine. The 'meager' amount of sampling that he's done is exactly what scientists do: sample. Without a few million dollars it would be difficult to do anything but sample. And you, as a fire specialist, sample. You know, those prism plots? or line intersects? So, clearly, your approach from the perspective of little sampling, is really just a poor defensive maneuver.
    The spin and the resulting debate, though, was not at an appropriate level of scientific inquiry. The 'conversations' after the fact were: 'How do we undermine his research to show what we want?' or 'How do we use it to show what we want?'. Basically, unnecessary, since he wasn't trying to play either side, he was trying to quantify regeneration losses. Which occur. Especially with heavy ground equipment. And that's fine, and acceptable since there is no particular reason to have millions of seedlings per acre.
    That's my little rant.
    Transmission out.

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13. 

    Backcut Posted 1:00 pm
    19 Oct 2007

    STILL...Instead of proving that "Post-fire Logging Hinders Regeneration and Increases Fire Risk", he actually proved the opposite! Just because Science Magazine didn't print the whole of his findings, doesn't make the title of his "study" true. What good is proof that logging kills SOME seedlings (but still remains well-stocked)? It seems rather ludricrous to prove the obvious.
    
    Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com

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14. 

    Backcut Posted 1:14 pm
    19 Oct 2007

    Please!If you haven't read the link to the article I supplied, please read it with an open mind. While the whole of it probably includes some spin, it is VERY convincing in showing that "Donato's-Law Study" is the exact same kind of junk science that the global warming deniers use.
    End of comments from me.
    
    Scenic pics at http://Lhfotoware.blogspot.com

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15. 

    atreyger Posted 9:38 am
    20 Oct 2007

    more on Donato's study.So, I read (not in depth) the article. It seems exactly like what I thought it was going to be: spin  from a forester's perspective. I am not saying that this is bad, especially since I agree with that perspective. I'm just saying that this is counter-spin to the spin provided by previous proponents (the likes of 'eco-centric' Society of Conservation Biology). And, this is really the funny part: the Evergreen article, ahem, fully agreed with the findings of the paper, in part by citing a previous paper (Roy 1957?) and in part saying that increased down woody debris was part of the silvicultural prescription. All while saying that these guys are wrong. How does that make sense?
    So, the authors of this article go on to do a whole bunch of other 'expose's', that are really basically a counter-spin for a particular world view. So, I find it hard to climb aboard that train, even if I do agree with the perspective that we need to cut wood, and we need to cut it sustainably. It's all a matter of perspective, and attacking science as 'junk science', when it is in fact agreeing with previous research, is total bullshit.
    Out.

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