Discerning Experts

The Practices of Scientific Assessment for Environmental Policy

By: Michael Oppenheimer, Naomi Oreskes, Dale Jamieson, Keynyn Brysse, Jessica OÂ¿Reilly

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Paperback | 7 March 2019 | Edition Number 1

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304 Pages

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2.33 x 1.66 x 0.19

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Discerning Experts assesses the assessments that many governments rely on to help guide environmental policy and action. Through their close look at environmental assessments involving acid rain, ozone depletion, and sea level rise, the authors explore how experts deliberate and decide on the scientific facts about problems like climate change. They also seek to understand how the scientists involved make the judgments they do, how the organization and management of assessment activities affects those judgments, and how expertise is identified and constructed. Discerning Experts uncovers factors that can generate systematic bias and error, and recommends how the process can be improved. As the first study of the internal workings of large environmental assessments, this book reveals their strengths and weaknesses, and explains what assessments can-and cannot - be expected to contribute to public policy and the common good.

Industry Reviews

"This book is a must-read for scientists and leaders of ongoing assessments, because it showcases the dilemma between consolidated knowledge, communicated as consensus, and challenges of uncertainties associated with emerging science."
--Thomas Stocker, University of Bern, Co-Chair of IPCC from 2008 to 2015
"A meticulously researched study . . . . Oppenheimer et al. have produced what is essentially an assessment of assessments, and so its syntheses of insights across the case-study chapters add new knowledge even while they validate old knowledge that had formerly been largely anecdotal for most of us. This volume is therefore essential reading for participants of any large environmental assessment. . . . Discerning Experts is not exactly the 'first' comparative study of multiple assessments, but it is an important one because of the extraordinary quality of its documentation and analysis as well as its clever creation of critical and instructive diversity across its three case studies. . . . Natural and physical scientists will see how their work can be transmitted across humanity to help inform opinion about what is going on and perhaps what to do--on the basis of rigorous science. Perhaps, the largest value will be found among the young scholars who do their homework after being invited to participate in their first assessment. After they read this volume, they will understand what to expect and why their signing on is a valuable investment of their time."-- "Climatic Change"

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