This Jonah Goldberg piece has to be read to be believed. How about this quote ?
On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but — which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people, we’d like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climate change. To do that, we need to get some broad-based support, to capture the public’s imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. … Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest.
Yup. Save the planet. No matter what you have to do.
Tags: climate, environmentalism, lying, science
Nice post, Dr. K. Remember, browsers, that Jonah Goldberg is quoting a climate scientist above.
But I am not surprised. When I was trying to apply for grants to student the genetic of bacteria in the late 1980s, I was encouraged to try to tie it into cancer—so that the funding would be incrementally more likely.
Of course, that was not honest.
Same thing here. Look at Paul Ehrlich, who is a very smart man, but inflamed by politics. So he wrote things—has written things and continues to do so—that I believe he knows very well to be gross exaggerations. But it is for a good cause, you see.
Al Gore, on the other hand, doesn’t understand any of the science.
Sometimes, people do their own causes damage. Isaac Asimov, in the 1950s, wrote a novella titled “The Martian Way.” Humans were trying to colonize Mars, and they needed water to use as reaction fluid for their rocket drives and for their small human colony on the Martian surface. The amount of water they used was tiny.
So a political group formed on Earth, and labeled the Martian colonists “Wasters,” and accused them of trying to drain Earth of its water. The truth, of course, is that the Martian colonists needed extremely tiny amounts of terrestrial water, compared to how much water was available on Earth (it didn’t have to be pure or fresh water, additionally).
Finally, the doughty colonists to to the moons of Saturn, and at great risk divert a large chunk of ice to Mars. It arrives just as the Earth government virtuously refuses all future use of terrestrial water to supply the Martian colony.
Asimov has openly admitted that he wrote the story as a metaphor for McCarthyism; using facts incorrectly to support a political movement. He was surprised that no one “got it.”
Anyone reading the novella today would “get” that it is an attack on the environmentalist movement, which Asimov very much supported!
Anyway, science should NEVER be wedded to politics. The latter corrupts and pollutes the former.
Sorry for the sermon. Selah.
I did the above from memory. Here is a nice synopsis of the story:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Martian_Way
My old professor used to say there were more people living off cancer than dying from it.
I have lost friends to HIV, Dr. K., but if you look at federal funding versus number of deaths…well, HIV is funded preferentially over heart disease, cancer, and so on. Or am I wrong?
Politics is always involved.
Now this is exactly what I thought was going on. The evidence is not overwhelmign either way. But at some point, a decision is made and evidence is marshaled in the interest of advocacy. It becomes marketing, or a case where you accentuate evidence in your favor and downplay the negative. Your client deserves no less.
Though I supported the war once we were in, I think we got into Iraq this way too, and I resent it.
How about World War I ? Much more evidence there.
Ah, that crafty Woodrow WIlson, Dr. K.!
Jonah Goldberg sure let him have it with a mallet.
But, the Zimmerman telegram!
Regardless of the merits, I just don’t like being “sold.”
Earth first! We’ll log the other planets later.
I’m with you, Professor LaRoche! But why not log different planets at the same time?
I, too, would like to emphasize that that quote is NOT by Jonah Goldberg – he was quoting Stephen Schneider.
I’m with you, Professor LaRoche! But why not log different planets at the same time?
Good idea. The dark side of the Force is strong with you!
“I, too, would like to emphasize that that quote is NOT by Jonah Goldberg – he was quoting Stephen Schneider.”
Yes, if I didn’t make that clear, apologize.
So, Professor LaRoche, what is your SIth Dark Lord name? If we are going to use Death Stars to detonate planets to get to that metal rich interior to build more Death Stars, we should get cracking.
After all, there are only so many midichlorians to go around!