Wednesday, June 23, 2010

IPCC Assessment Report 5 authors

Can be found here.

Not too many surprises from what I can see, apart from the author of the previous version who insisted shortly afterwards that it was such a nightmare that he wouldn't consider doing it again...and is now a coordinating lead (OK, I'm not really surprised by this).

On principle I'd always like to see more fresh faces and fewer of the same old same old, but I haven't actually looked carefully enough to know if that is actually a fair criticism of this selection. There is a small selection of the obvious Japanese candidates.

6 comments:

Steve Bloom said...

That's funny, Judy Curry seemed to think it was a big improvement on the AR4. Of course she may be engaged in a little projection as to how receptive others are to her views.

James Annan said...

Well, maybe it is, and maybe it isn't. I really haven't done a careful analysis. A certain amount of continuity is probably useful, but fresh faces/ideas (and not just collaborators of the established ones) are important too!

EliRabett said...

From what Eli gathers CLAs get paid and control a budget. Not that Eli is a cynic

James Annan said...

I doubt that those direct rewards are much of a motivation, more the generalised fame and influence and chance to ensure that their own research gets its due attention :-) But I bet they think they are sacrificing themselves for the general good.

EliRabett said...

Not to put too fine a point on it, but if you are on soft money, damn sure the support is important.

James Annan said...

I expect that a large majority of the CLAs are tenured. Of course, a bit of extra money is rarely unwelcome.