As a courtesy I informed Ray about the correction after posting it here last night. I have not yet asked the Bulletin to correct the error.
On Saturday, September 7, 2019 at 11:35:59 AM UTC+1, Oliver Morton wrote: > > Dear Andy > > Have you communicated this directly to Ray or to The Bulletin? > > On Friday, 6 September 2019 19:23:08 UTC+1, Andy Parker wrote: >> >> Hi folks, >> >> >> I’m writing to correct an error made by Ray Pierrehumbert in a recent >> opinion piece on SRM, which has only just come to my attention. In an >> article published in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Ray wrote: >> >> “*it is apparent that over time, the Environmental Defense Fund is >> gradually becoming, at the very least, a partner in a governance initiative >> that, in my view, has taken it as a foregone conclusion that outdoor >> experimentation at some scale will happen – and that the only question is >> how to govern it so it takes place in a so-called safe way (SRMGI 2019). >> The governance initiative fails to ask the deeper question of whether it is >> wise at this point to engage in research that could facilitate the >> deployment of a technology that may well prove ungovernable*”. >> >> https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00963402.2019.1654255 >> >> >> I direct the governance initiative in question (SRMGI) and I wanted to >> point out that we don’t have any position on outdoors experimentation and >> we do explicitly ask the "deeper question" of whether it is wise to engage >> in outdoors research. Earlier this week we ran a workshop in Abidjan, Cote >> d’Ivoire, and I've attached the relevant slide from a group exercise. >> Translated it reads: >> >> >> *Scientists from Harvard are planning an SRM experiment in the next year. >> The experiment would involve releasing one kilogram of sulphur dioxide into >> the stratosphere in order to better understand possible impacts on >> atmospheric chemistry, including the destruction of ozone. The experiment >> wouldn't have any negative environmental impacts and couldn't be done in a >> lab, but some people are concerned about the sociopolitical impacts.* >> >> *1. Is this research welcome or unwelcome, and why?* >> >> *2. If the decision to approve the experiment were down to you, what >> information would you want in order to make the decision?* >> >> >> >> In case of interest, and quite unsurprisingly, the question returned a >> wide range of views and a vigorous debate between the ~100 participants. >> Some people were concerned about decision-making processes and about who >> got to evaluate the experiment's physical risks, some people wondered what >> future research projects this might lead onto, some people were happy to >> see the research proceed as they thought that it might be useful and that >> the levels of risk were acceptable. >> >> >> >> Hope that this sets the record straight. >> >> >> >> Andy >> > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/geoengineering/72619117-0337-44b1-a3d1-dbf8be563dce%40googlegroups.com.
