See
Are Microbiologists Climate-Denying Science Haters? by Alex Berezow. Dr. Alex Berezow joined the American Council on Science and Health as Senior Fellow of Biomedical Science in May 2016. He holds a Ph.D. in microbiology.
"Recently,
I gave a seminar on "fake news" to professors and grad students at a
large public university. Early in my talk, I polled the audience: "How
many of you believe climate change is the world's #1 threat?"
Silence. Not a single person raised his or her hand.
Was I speaking in front of a group of science deniers? The College
Republicans? Some fringe libertarian club? No, it was a room full of
microbiologists.
How could so many incredibly intelligent people overwhelmingly reject
what THE SCIENCE says about climate change? Well, they don't. They just
don't see it as big of a threat to the world as other things.
Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of them felt that antibiotic
resistance and pandemic disease were the biggest global threats. One
person thought geopolitical instability was the biggest concern.
I told them that I believed
poverty was the world's biggest threat. The reason is poverty is the underlying condition that causes so much misery in the world. Consider that
1.3 billion people don't have electricity.
And then consider how the lack of that basic necessity -- what the rest
of us take completely for granted -- hinders their ability to develop
economically and to succeed, let alone to have access to adequate
healthcare. If we fix poverty,
we could stop easily preventable health problems, such as infectious disease and malnutrition.
Was I booed out of the room? No, the audience understood why I
believed what I did. But woe unto you who try to have a similar
conversation with climate warriors.
Woe Unto You, Bret Stephens
Conservative columnist Bret Stephens, formerly of the
Wall Street Journal, landed a new gig at the
New York Times. His very first column, "
Climate of Complete Certainty," caused much weeping and gnashing of teeth. And probably the rending of garments. What did he say that caused so much outrage?
In a nutshell, his thesis was that certainty often backfires. He used
the Hillary Clinton campaign as an example; in his view, certainty of
victory was one factor in her defeat. Next, Mr. Stephens drew an analogy
with climate science, worrying that the certainty expressed by the most
vocal proponents of major climate policy reforms are speaking with a
sense of certainty that is not well-founded. He warned against taking
imperfect models too seriously and the dangers of hyperbolic
doom-mongering.
It often irks me when political commentators write about science,
usually because they haven't the foggiest clue what they're talking
about. But Mr. Stephens' article used reasonable and cautious language,
and to my knowledge, he didn't write anything that was factually
incorrect. He simply concluded, as I myself have, that doomsday
prophesying is wrong -- and even if it was right, it convinces few
people, anyway. (Do the antics of the Westboro Baptist Church change
anyone's mind?)
Yet, the reaction was swift and entirely predictable.
Vox, whose stated mission is to "explain the news," called Mr. Stephens a "bullshitter."
GQ ran the headline, "Bret Stephens Is Why Liberals Have Every Right to Be Dicks." And
Wikipedia (whose founder is going to try to solve the problem of fake news) labeled him a "contrarian."
All that because Mr. Stephens warned against speaking hyperbolically. The concept of irony appears to be lost on his critics.
Can Smart People Disagree About the Threat of Climate Change?
What so many in the media (and apparently the climate science
community) fail to understand is that people have different values and
priorities. Foreign policy analysts are terrified of North Korea.
Economists fear Brexit and a Eurozone collapse. Geologists, especially
those in the Pacific Northwest, fear a huge earthquake. Experts across
the spectrum perceive threats differently, usually magnifying those with
which they are most familiar.
That means smart people can accept a common core of facts (such as
the reality of anthropogenic global warming) without agreeing on a
policy response.
Yet instead of being a place to debate a policy response for complex
science issues, the media have chosen to be an extension of the militant
Twitterverse. Even if you are just discussing courses of action, you
are not allowed to deviate from climate orthodoxy lest you be labeled a
science-denying heretic.
Perhaps journalists should spend more time talking to microbiologists."
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