In honor of the meetings on climate change in Denmark and the recent "Climategate" revelations, I thought I would reprise the first post I wrote touching on climate change back in September of 2005. We frequently hear people decry big insurance, big oil, big business, or big labor, etc. How about big science?
Publicly Funded Science, Global Warming, and Christian Responsibility
Galileo Galilei's encounter with the Church is the quintessential
example of the quest for scientific truth being subverted by powerful
gatekeepers of dogma. The Church has long since lost its gate keeping
status but that does not mean that powerful gatekeepers have
disappeared. In fact, a powerful new community of gate keepers has
emerged in my lifetime. Here is how it came about.
The Manhattan Project of World War II was one of the most
significant scientific feats of the 20th Century. An incredible level
of cooperation across institutions and disciplines rendered the atomic
bomb. President Roosevelt was so impressed by the achievements of this
team of scientists that he asked MIT Engineer and White House official
Vannevar Bush to pursue the possibility of ongoing scientific research
sponsored by the federal government.
Bush came back with a report called Science: The Endless Frontier.
The report extolled the ability of government to address a host human
dilemmas through the coordination and funding of scientific research.
In response, President Truman signed in to law legislation that would
create the National Science Foundation which would answer to the office
of the President.
By 1961, President Dwight Eisenhower was expressing concern about
the growing involvement of the federal government in science research.
In his farewell address January 17, 1961, he said:
The
prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment,
project allocations, and the power of money is ever present -- and is
gravely to be regarded. Yet, holding scientific research and discovery
in respect, as we should, we must always be alert to the equal and
opposite danger that public policy could itself become a captive of a
scientific-technological elite.
The National Science Foundation, the Department of Defense and the
Department of Energy have become major sources for scientific funding.
Funding is awarded based on the scientific paradigms and priorities of
the government. Initially funding focused on health and military
research. During the 1960s, Kennedy promoted his ambitious plans to put
a man on the Moon by the end of the decade and Johnson declared War on
Poverty, conjuring up the idea of the united war effort during WWII.
Coordinated scientific efforts played major roles in these programs.
Meanwhile, Rachel Carson published her book in 1962, entitled Silent Spring, which more or less ignited the modern environmentalist movement. Then Paul Ehrlich published his book Population Bomb
in 1968, where he predicted depleted fuel resources, massive famines,
and host of other disasters based on scientific assessments. Four years
later came the Club of Rome report Limits to Growth.
It echoed and expanded on similar themes including a proposal to divide
the world into ten governmental units to "manage" the scarce resources
for the world. A few years later in 1980, the Carter Administration
produced the Global 2000 Report
which repeated more of the same. So, what happened over the past 25
years? World population grew at a much reduced rates than anyone
predicted, hunger and famine have been dramatically reduced, and even
with the present fuel shortage prices in the United States we are still
below 1970s inflation adjusted prices.
By the end of the 1980s, many of the global disaster prophecies were
beginning to look pretty silly. Government was still declaring its new
wars on social issues. The latest was the War on Drugs. With looming
global disaster fading from the scene as "war targets," grounded space
exploration, and free market mechanisms successfully addressing many
economic issues, new justifications were needed for science
expenditures. Fortunately, a new global disaster emerged on the scene:
Global warming.
During the 1990s, with assistance of a more than sympathetic
administration, global warming became the funding topic of the day. The
United Nations was already very much on the bandwagon with this
concern. Just as with past administrations in the USA, the government
set the paradigms and parameters for funding.
Now, if your organization's funding is at all government dependent,
how likely are you to report back to the government that the scientific
paradigm they are using is bogus? If you like working at scientific
research and like to eat, it is not likely. Thus, a reinforcing
feedback loop has been created. The government keeps funding research
and they keep hearing what they want to hear. But it doesn't end there.
For a research scientist, an essential activity for advancement is
peer-reviewed publications. How does this work? A journal receives a
study for potential publication. It is submitted to leading scientists
with expertise in the field the study addresses. Who are these expert
reviewers? Most often, they are the ones who have been successful at
working the government funding game to get money for research.
(Journals keep confidential who reviews what studies.) Guess what
happens when research comes along that threatens the paradigm, which is
the government's paradigm, which is in turn the ultimate source of the
reviewer's salary? Consequently, challenge to paradigms becomes
daunting far beyond just the intellectual and factual challenges.
Challenge the dogma of the gatekeepers and you learn what Galileo
learned.
The global warming paradigm, as funded by the government, is described well by Patrick J. Michaels in his book Meltdown.
The
earth's surface temperature is influenced by human activity, and
changes that are being measured today are largely consequences of that
activity. We are developing the ability to quantify those changes from
basic physical principles, and have determined that the major cause of
recent climate change is the emission of carbon dioxide from the
combustion of fossil fuel. Improved quantification of those changes
will give policymakers improved guidance on what might be required to
slow, stop, or reverse those changes.
The evidence is not bearing this out. A better paradigm that describes the facts is:
The
earth's surface temperature is influenced by human activity, and
changes that are being measured today are largely consequences of that
activity. We know, to a very small range of error, the amount of future
climate change for the foreseeable future and it is a modest value to
which humans have adapted and will continue to adapt. There is no
known, feasible policy that can stop or even slow these changes in a
fashion that could be scientifically measured.
The fact is that most of the alarmist stories about global warming in publications like Time, Newsweek, and major newspapers are refuted almost as quickly as they are published. The same is true for publications like Science or Nature.
Sometimes they are refuted as misrepresentations of the findings by the
very researchers who conducted the studies. These refutations are
rarely published or given the same consideration as the alarmist
stories that make the front page.
The United Nations, progressives (often championing collectivist
solutions), the press, and significant pockets within the scientific
community, are intermeshed in support of the paradigm. Their
interlocking vested interests are highly resistant to challenge.
The solution to global warming by these gate keepers are things like
the draconian Kyoto Protocols. One of the Protocols' provisions is that
the United States reduce its carbon dixoide emission levels to rates 5%
below 1900s averages. Why not 10%? 25%? 2%? There is no rationale
because no direct link can be shown between the emissions and the
environmental effects.
As Christians we have a responsibility to be environmental stewards.
We also have a responsibility to discern truth. Our stewardship should
spring out of our appreciation for the world God has given us rather
than from alarmist half-truths and errors that aim to limit open and
free societies out of fear. The global warming movement is less about
science and more about people, wittingly and unwittingly, seeking
limitations on free societies based on foundationless fear. Let the
church not make the same mistake it made 400 years ago by standing with
dogma, whatever its source, against scientific inquiry.
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