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biology+acidification

The Decline Effect – Part 1: Ocean Acidification

by K. Hansen, Feb 22, 2022 in WUWT

There have been a couple of mentions of the decline effect over the past month, mostly prompted by a recent paper that appeared in  PLOS BIOLOGY  authored by Jeff Clements, Josefin Sundin, Timothy Clark, and Fredrik Jutfelt titled “Meta-analysis reveals an extreme “decline effect” in the impacts of ocean acidification on fish behavior”.

The subject matter of the paper, examining the decline effect in the field of Ocean Acidification (OA), particularly in studies on the effects of OA on fish behavior, is itself interesting.  I have written about OA and OA science many times here at WUWT.

There are two parts to this story about the decline effect.  1)  The specific case of the decline effect in OA studies claimed in the Clements et al. paper.   2)  The general case of the hypothesized causes of the decline effect in the sciences.

This essay will address the first issue:  the decline effect in OA studies.

The decline effect in OA science:

As for the specific OA case,  part of that story, featured in the Clements et al. paper,  has been well-covered by Steve Milloy at JunkScience in his article “Climate fish scare turns out to be just a fish story”.

There are several obvious potential causes of a decline effect in a field. They are: publication bias, citation bias, methodological bias, and investigator effects. 

As part of the review process of the new Clement et al. paper, each of those potential causes was investigated – and all but one were eliminated as a major cause.  It is that last cause that I write about today.

The missing parts in Steve Milloy’s coverage are something that I have written about before and is left under-said Clements et al. (2022):

First, you may recall that Timothy Clark (one of the co-authors of Clements (2022)) and others wrote a paper bluntly titled: “Ocean acidification does not impair the behaviour of coral reef fishes” published Nature in January 2020.

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climate-debate

Marshall Islands Growing, Not Shrinking. World Bank’s Embarrassing Error In Alarmist 2021 Report

by C. Rotter, Feb 21, 2022 in WUWT

Last October, just before Glasgow Climate Conference, the World Bank issued a report with a dire warning for the Marshall Islands. It claimed: “Rising sea levels in the atoll nation of Marshall Islands are projected to endanger 40 percent of existing buildings in the capital, Majuro, with 96 percent of the city at risk of frequent flooding induced by climate change.”

The startling claims were based on “new visual models” and that the rising sea levels were due to co2-induced warming.

But now we learn that the model inputs were garbage, and so the model outputs were garbage as well. Nothing of the sort is going to happen to the Marshall Islands anytime soon.

Analysis shows 4% growth from 1945 to 2010!

German climate site Die kalte Sonne here took a closer look at the dramatic claims and found the World Bank report had a grave error: they failed to account for the role that coral reefs play in island building.

A 2015 paper published by Ford et al indeed found that the opposite is happening: the islands are expanding and not sinking and shrinking. The paper’s abstract:

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