No, I'm not trying to cause trouble. And let me say quite emphatically at the outset that I'm not trying to start a debate about global warming (at least at the moment). But I can't help thinking that there is something deeper going on in the global warming brouhaha (I always enjoy using that word)—something more than science—something ideological, emotional or even religious.
I get this feeling every time I observe interactions between the large majority of scientists (who take what is now regarded as the orthodox view of climate change) and the small minority who hold a different view. Actually, there are three positions I've observed, not two, among scientists who are in a position to know something about the data. There is the overwhelmingly dominant view that human-induced climate change is real and very serious, and if that we don’t take serious steps over the next decade or two, then we are in for some very nasty consequences come 2050 and beyond. To the ‘left’ of this majority view is a minority who think that things are actually even worse, that catastrophic consequences are but a matter of years away, and that utterly drastic action is required and now. Well-known Australian author Tim Flannery would be in this category. To the ‘right’ of the majority is the sceptical minority of scientists who acknowledge that warming is happening, and that it is human-induced to a significant extent, but who do not think that it constitutes nearly as big a problem as the majority view maintains, and who think that many of the proposed solutions (such as the Kyoto Protocol) are a bad idea. Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences at MIT, is among those who hold this view.
Now differences of opinion among scientists are normal and to be expected, and vigorous debate among scientists is the rule, not the exception. Science is not an abstract entity; it is an acitivity of people, and people interpret data differently, bring different assumptions to the table, and make different judgements. People change their mind, or make new discoveries, or make new connections between previously disparate facts.
Science, then, is always changing, shifting and re-evaluating according to new discoveries, new data and new interpretations of the data. It does not appeal to an outside entity (like God or some authority) for the final word. There is always new ground to be broken, and no hypothesis is immune from questioning and re-evaluation. In fact, the motto of The Royal Society (the UK's national academy of science, and one of the oldest scientific organizations in the world) is Nullius in Verba: “nobody's word is final”.
It is highly interesting, then, that a pamphlet put out by the Royal Society on ‘Climate Change Controversies’ says this:
This is not intended to provide exhaustive answers to every contentious argument that has been put forward by those who seek to distort and undermine the science of climate change and deny the seriousness of the potential consequences of global warming.
It sounds rather like The Royal Society's word is final, and that those who hold a different view are enemies of science, only seeking to distort and undermine.
I came across this example in a fascinating article by Princeton physicist Freeman Dyson, writing in a recent edition of The New York Review of Books. In Dyson's experience, any scientist who dares to dissent from the prevailing orthodoxy is treated as having apostasized or betrayed science. Any dialogue between these two views seems impossible:
Their conversation is a dialogue of the deaf. The majority responds to the minority with open contempt.
Even more interestingly, Dyson goes on to suggest that there is much more than ‘science’ going on here:
All the books that I have seen about the science and economics of global warming, including the two books under review, miss the main point. The main point is religious rather than scientific. There is a worldwide secular religion which we may call environmentalism, holding that we are stewards of the earth, that despoiling the planet with waste products of our luxurious living is a sin, and that the path of righteousness is to live as frugally as possible. The ethics of environmentalism are being taught to children in kindergartens, schools, and colleges all over the world.
Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion ...
Unfortunately, some members of the environmental movement have also adopted as an article of faith the belief that global warming is the greatest threat to the ecology of our planet. That is one reason why the arguments about global warming have become bitter and passionate.
This is an important perspective, and one that I haven’t heard discussed at any length. Most religious or theological responses to global warming focus on how we might respond to the problem (as those whom God has put in charge of his world, and so on). But what of the secular religion of environmentalism, and its place in driving the debate and our response to it? And what effect do these deeper ideological and philosophical factors have on the way that the debate unfolds? For example, it is interesting how often we hear the phrase “the science is settled”, as if no further debate or investigation is allowed, nor any other view remotely possible. Is the science ever settled? I thought that “nobody's word is final”.
I can't help feeling that the extraordinary passion with which the majority view is embraced and defended by scientists has something to do with science seeking to reclaim its mantle as the saviour of the world. The modern positivist view of science took a took a beating in the latter half of the 20th century—not only from events as they unfolded, but from the postmodern philosophy that accompanied them. Does science want to see itself once again as that glorious army of men in white coats who will save the planet? Or are we simply witnessing the coming of age of environmentalism as the secular mainstream religion of our day?
