http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/2010/02/real-struggle-behind-climate-change-war.html http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/2010/02/distinguishing-climate-deniers-from.html
His comments in the first one I think are really telling, -- That is because science itself is the main issue: its relevance and utility as a decision-making tool. Let there be no mistake, this is all about power, and the struggle goes way back. In Britain, the "Boffin Principle" long held that technical people have no business making policy suggestions to their betters. In America, waves of anti-intellectual populism - like the 19th Century Know Nothing Party - were deliberately stoked by aristocracies who saw the new, mental elites as a threat. There have been counter-surges. In the 1930s, propelled by ambitious modernism and depression-era desperation, a briefly popular "Technocracy Movement" held that knowledge and skill should be paramount criteria for positions of leadership. A milder version of this eagerness for expertise was seen from Sputnik through the 1960s and 1970s, with glimmers during the Internet Boom years. (Notably, these were all lush times for science fiction literature.) Of course, Technocracy was boneheaded and scary - though not as much as the new know-nothing era that we have endured during the last decade or so, a time when things became dicey even for the Civil Service and the U.S. Officer Corps. Chris Mooney documents how relentless this agenda has been, in The Republican War on Science. Though, let's be fair. If films like Avatar are any indication, a variant of dour anti-scientific fever rages on the left, as well. This is the context in which we should reconsider the Climate Change Denial Movement. While murky in its scientific assertions -- (some claim the Earth isn't warming, while others say the ice-free Arctic won't be any of our doing) -- the core contention remains remarkably consistent. It holds that the 99% of atmospheric scientists who believe in GCC are suborned, stupid, incompetent, conspiratorial or untrustworthy hacks. As part of a more general assault on the very notion of expertise, the narrative starts with a truism that is actually true: "Not every smart person is wise..." only then extrapolates it, implicitly, to a blatant falsehood "all smartypants are unwise, all the time; and my uninformed opinion is equal to any expert testimony." Does that sound like a polemical stretch? But it is precisely the implied subtext - a perverse kind of populism - at all levels of the War on Science. In the specific case of GCC, since almost all top atmospheric scientists accept human-propelled climate change, they must be all cretins, corrupt, or cowards. Here's a telling point. This uniformity of craven venality has to include even the ambitious postdocs and recently-tenured junior professors who, in every other field, sift constantly for some flaw in the current paradigm in order to go gunning after the big boys and thus make a reputation. What, even the Young Guns are sellouts? Even the paladins of skeptical enquiry are conspiring together in a grand cabal to... ...to what? Ah, now the story gets even better. All the scientists and post-docs are colluding to foist this scam, in order to win a few ten-thousand dollar grants. This loose-change-grubbing, paradigm slavery is cited to explain the GCC imbroglio -- while the oilcos and petroprinces, who operate major propaganda outlets and have TRILLIONS staked in the status quo... they have no agenda at all. Of course, to typify any lawful profession as across-the-board corrupt or cowardly is absurd, but to so besmirch the one professional cohort that is unambiguously the most brave, individualistic, honest, curious and smart of all, well, there has to be an agenda behind such drivel -- and there is one. The good old Boffin Effect. -- -- Larry C. Lyons web: http://www.lyonsmorris.com/lyons LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/larryclyons -- The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do. - B. F. Skinner - ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:312594 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
