Discerning Experts: The Practices of Scientific Assessment for Environmental Policy

298 Pages·2019·3.451 MB·English

by  Michael Oppenheimer, Naomi Oreskes, Dale Jamieson, Keynyn Brysse, Jessica O’Reilly, Matthew Shindell, Milena Wazeck

Discerning Experts

Discerning Experts
The Practices of Scientific Assessment
for Environmental Policy
M i c h a e l O p p e n h e i M e r ,
n a O M i O r e s k e s , D a l e J a M i e s O n ,
k e y n y n B r y s s e , J e s s i c a O ’ r e i l ly,
M a t t h e w s h i n D e l l , a n D
M i l e n a wa z e c k
University of chicago press
chicago and london
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2019 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations
in critical articles and reviews. For more information, contact the
University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637.
Published 2019
Printed in the United States of America
28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 1 2 3 4 5
isbn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 60196- 0 (cloth)
isbn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 60201- 1 (paper)
isbn- 13: 978- 0- 226- 60215- 8 (e- book)
doi: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226602158.001.0001
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Oppenheimer, Michael, author. | Oreskes, Naomi, author. |
Jamieson, Dale, author. | Brysse, Keynyn, author. | O’Reilly,
Jessica, 1978– author. | Shindell, Matthew, author. | Wazeck, Milena, author.
Title: Discerning experts : the practices of scientific assessment for
environmental policy / Michael Oppenheimer, Naomi Oreskes, Dale Jamieson,
Keynyn Brysse, Jessica O’Reilly, Matthew Shindell, and Milena Wazeck.
Description: Chicago ; London : University of Chicago Press, 2019. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: lccn 2018021455 | isbn 9780226601960 (cloth : alk. paper) |
isbn 9780226602011 (pbk. : alk. paper) | isbn 9780226602158 (e-book)
Subjects: lcsh: Environmental sciences—Research—Evaluation. |
Environmental sciences—Research—Evaluation—Case studies. | Acid rain—Research—
United States—Evaluation. | National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program (U.S.) |
Ozone layer depletion—Research—Evaluation. | Sea level—Research—Antarctica—
Evaluation. | Environmental policy—Research—United States. | Research—
Evaluation. | Expertise.
Classification: lcc ge70 .o66 2019 | ddc 363.7/0561—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018021455
♾ This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso z39.48– 1992
(Permanence of Paper).
We dedicate this book to
Stephen H. Schneider
(1945– 2010)
friend, colleague, inspiration
and
Bert Bolin
(1925– 2007)
for his foresight and steady leadership

Contents
Preface • ix
List of Abbreviations • xiii
1  The Need for Expert Judgment  1
2 assessing acid rain in the United states:
The National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program  19
3  Assessing Ozone Depletion  81
4  Assessing the Ice: Sea Level Rise Predictions from the 
West Antarctic Ice Sheet, 1981– 2007  127
5  Patrolling the Science/Policy Border  171
6  What Assessments Do  195
  Conclusion  211
List of Interviews • 223
Notes • 227
Bibliography • 257
Index • 273

Preface
This book, and the project it embodies, originated with a chance encounter 
between Naomi Oreskes and Michael Oppenheimer at the annual meeting 
of the American Geophysical Union at the end of 2006. Oreskes has a long 
involvement in questions about the nature of scientific knowledge, from the 
perspective of both a geologist and a science studies scholar. Oppenheimer 
is a climate scientist with a long record of participation in ozone and climate 
assessments, including the then- ongoing Fourth Assessment Report of the In-
tergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and he had become intrigued by the 
processes by which experts decide on matters of fact and uncertainty and 
how expert judgment has sometimes gone awry. Both were curious about 
the inner workings of assessments and how scientists arrived at their con-
clusions. Oreskes and Oppenheimer engaged the interest of Dale Jamieson, 
a philosopher of science who had studied the National Acid Precipitation As-
sessment Program. Together the three designed a project to investigate how 
assessments operate in practice— how assessors come to their views and make 
the requisite judgments about the state of scientific knowledge.
International expert assessments have become an approach favored by 
governments for obtaining advice on the science, economics, and policy 
options available to confront large- scale environmental problems. Assess-
ments that emerged in the 1970s altered both the policy landscape and the 
practice of environmental science. Understanding how assessments operate 
requires reconstructing the deliberations of expert participants, who reach 
judgments about what is known and what is uncertain in the scientific and 
political context of their times.