Politics and Science-By-Consensus
While politics enters most every aspect of life, the realm of science seemed to have most resistant to its influence… but that wall appears to be crumbling at a disturbing rate… and the integrity of scientific facts is coming into doubt. By definition, a scientific fact is absolute and is not subject to interpretation.
If the freezing point of water was found to be a certain temperature by one group of scientists, a different temperature for second group of scientists, yet a third temperature for another group, and so on… they might have data for discussing the phenomenon but they could not, by consensus, declare the freezing point of water to be, say, the average of their data. Their agreed upon “freezing point of water” might be true in certain cases but not true in others; their agreement would not be a fact.
Even worse is when either the strong influence of outside organized interests is exerted or the personal agendas of some scientists become involved and the scientific process is subverted. When scientific data is purposely distorted when presented to the public, and done so in an alarmist fashion, they are misled to erroneous conclusions, and then they cry for some response from their elected representatives. In such matters where scientific data is the foundation, it is the duty of these representatives to respond rationally, not emotionally. They should address problems that are both real and can be fixed!
Let’s play a little “what if?”:
- What if the world population was somehow mesmerized into believing that aliens from outer space where going to destroy the Earth, despite no substantial evidence to support that belief, unless we built a giant tinfoil blanket in geo-orbit above us all?
- What if everyone was convinced that electricity was killing people (even citing real examples!!) and demanded that all electrical lines and devices be replaced with something less harmful?
- What if a majority of the world’s surgeons decided that washing their hands before operating was reducing the number of patients that could be attended to and, based on their consensus, banned that practice?
Somebody has to keep a clear head in such situations or we run the risk of placing unnecessary hurdles in front of ourselves. If based on unproven scientific data, such hurdles, usually in the form of expensive laws or mandates, will not solve the perceived problem and will steal resources (money) from other areas where the need is real and the solution will actually lead to positive results. These hurdles become a self-imposed handicap.
While I’m all for conservation of resources and doing thing in a way that will be good for our environment, I am disappointed at how much momentum the “global warming” crusade has gained based on so little actual, undisputed evidence. More accurately, I am less skeptical that global warming may be a fact (though it has always gone through cycles, I am still not convinced about its actual state at this moment in time) than I am about it being caused by humans (which I think is a huge vanity). If people could control the weather, I believe it would have been demonstrated before and every scientist would agree that human actions could change it, for better or worse. In fact, if people could actually control the weather, we’d ALL know it since it would be going on all the time! That simply isn’t the case. In fact, we cannot even reliably PREDICT the weather, much less modify it.
There are many sources of information on this particular topic. One I would recommend checking is:
ICECAP, International Climate and Environmental Change Assessment Project
“Global warming” is not the only area where public hysteria seems to have taken hold, there are others… and I’ll address them in future discussions. Again, my concern is that we are trying to solve problems that are either (a) not problems or (b) not solvable. Life is short and resources are limited. We must choose wisely where to best spend both.
Here’s the bottom line: feel free to believe what you want when that belief only affects you. If your beliefs lead to actions that impact others, however, it is YOUR responsibility to ensure those beliefs are founded on facts.
Personal reponsibility.
