The Wide Awakes » Faith-Based Science

3/31/2007

It was Thomas Henry Huxley who referred to ‘The great tragedy of Science - the slaying of a beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact’. Right about now, I’m thinking anthropogenic global warming is at the chalk outline stage. Evidence like this keeps coming in. Not to belabour the point, but anthropogenic warming is a tough sell when there’s no anthro around to genic up the warming.

Of course, this is where the rubber meets the road. In so far as Liberals have spent so long berating Conservatives as anti-science that’s kind of obscured the fact that very little of what the Left cites actually qualifies as any kind of science. Au contraire, when the science points one way, and the ideology the other, it’s never too tough for the Left to decide which way to jump.

Here’s how Liberal scientists interpret their role:

we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This ‘double ethical bind’ we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest.

Needless to say, global warming groupies have taken that baton and run with it. Here’s UEA’s Mike Hulme on what the Left really thinks about science.

Self-evidently dangerous climate change will not emerge from a normal scientific process of truth seeking, although science will gain some insights into the question if it recognises the socially contingent dimensions of a post-normal science. But to proffer such insights, scientists - and politicians - must trade (normal) truth for influence.

Yowser! It’s like they don’t realise we’re listening. But leave aside the sheer weirdness of hearing taxpayer-funded academics debate how best to defraud the public, and think about what it implies about the Liberal philosophy of science. If science now includes stuff that doesn’t come from the ‘normal scientific process of truth seeking’, just what’s scientific about it ?

Scientists arguing against the scientific process would be ironic enough at the best of times, but consider what’s just been published by Nature. The journal which carried Crick & Watson’s structure for DNA now devotes space to the need to edit the Bible.

No, seriously.

This time round the excuse is that the geeks are worried about religiously-motivated violence, hence the concentration on the Bible. Or something. Call it a hunch, but I think we can safely say that if someone cites the Bible as the most extreme example of religion motivating violence in the modern world, it’s not about religious violence.

Personally, I’ve never seen what the problem is. If you think Christianity is bunk anyway, who cares what particular flavour of bunkum it actually is ? But no, you can’t stop the geeks going on about it – it’s the perfect exemplar of how modern Liberals seem much more obsessed with what they hate, than in actually advocating anything positive. But hang on a mo’ – isn’t there some double-dipping going on there ?

If these folks ‘know’ that anthropogenic climate change is happening, but can’t actually prove it, doesn’t that sound all a little, well, faith-based ? Indeed, isn’t there something of the medieval priesthood about the demand that we give special credence to the pronouncements of scientists, even when they can’t produce any actual, y’know, science ? They’ll be slaughtering heretics next!

Uh oh – looks like they’re way ahead of us. As the Great Ann said, can you really imagine Niels Bohr responding to Albert Einstein’s letter questioning quantum mechanics with a statement like: “If you continue to speak out, you won’t live to see further quantum mechanics.” ?But that’s what counts as science these days (no wonder they get on so well with the Religion of Peace).

Curiously, in so far as it involves more tax, big government and more central planning, the science-approved method for dealing with global warming turns out to be exactly the same as the one to deal with global cooling. Well, hey, it must have worked right ? Still, I guess that’s one good thing. The supremacy of freedom and free markets is now so obvious that even Leftists seem to agree that they can only get traction for their idiot ideas by dressing up as forest pixies. So, on the Right we can point to the reality of unprecedented wealth and quality of life, while the Left has the possibility of drowning polar bears, and nothing says ‘hard science’ like cute bears. But don’t point that out - the Left will accuse you of hating science.

Said DJ @ 9:17 am | Permalink