On 10/25/06, James Annan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> Michael Tobis wrote:
> > Oog. This is coming up pretty high in Google searches for me. That
> > could turn out to be awkward.
> >
> > Let me add, in the interests of being perceived as an honest and fair
> > person, that I have equally little patience for people who have made up
> > their mind and use science selectively to advocate the other "side" of
> > this question. They tend to be a little less sophisticated and less
> > funded on this particular issue, but they are equally unhelpful.
>
> Do you think that this description applies to (m)any climate scientists?
Now that, on the other hand, is a good question.
What is it that distinguishes denialism from skepticism? Is there a
spectrum or is there a clear distinction?
I think there is. This is the distinction that John McCarthy used to
call "lawyers' science": starting from the conclusion and working back
toward the evidence.
There is a very real difference of attitude between an honest belief,
however well-informed or misguided, and cynical advocacy, however
based in fact or in misrepresentation.
Can we tell the difference? Not right away, of course. This is the
problem I was addressing at the start of this thread. It's only after
we engage with a person that we can distinguish between honest
argument and mere construction of argument-shaped objects.
The point of the irresponsible arguer is not to discover truth but to
advocate a position independent of whether it is true or not. On the
question "anthropogenic carbon dioxide: friend or foe?" the evidence
is pretty much in, so necessarily one side of the advocacy argument is
forced to manipulate the information more vigorously than the other.
The point of the skeptic is that "you guys remind me of other guys who
have burned me in the past; you're going to have to make a very strong
case." The best thing to do about those guys is to make a very strong
case. They might not be aware of the extent of the active
misrepresentation abounding in the world, though, and they are not
typically climate experts.
There are the marginal cases, e.g. great-grandpa Lindzen. I don't
think we can as easily dismiss those as, say, Oreskes claims, but they
are strikingly rare.
mt
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