Wiki on global cooling.
Points made:
-- The 70s were the beginning of a growing awareness of human driven climate change.
-- While there was concern that "global cooling" was underway, the larger sense was that gross changes were being effected, without knowing what the outcome would be.
--Popular press descriptions of global cooling left out that sense of uncertainty, and caveats that are typical for science. Basically the research was saying "We think global cooling is underway, but we're not sure because the larger processes aren't that well understood. We are pretty sure some kind of large scale change is underway.
--The role of greenhouse gases was just starting to be understood.
--The consensus shifted fairly quickly from cooling to warming models, as more attention and research began to move to human driven climate change, and the role of greenhouse gases were factored in.
Now, when you link to something that purports to show how silly old science got it wrong, so how can we know they aren't getting it wrong again, that is, in fact, "mocking", Chris.
It's mocking because it substitutes "gotcha" for any awareness of how science works, how consensus is built and what it looks like.
Will climate science change its model again? It might. Will it turn out that cigarettes don't cause cancer? Maybe. But linking to medical journals of the 60s that are ambiguous about the cause and effect and mechanisms of that process doesn't make that any more likely, and it doesn't indicate that medical science is an ad hoc affair that might say one thing today and another thing tomorrow.
Although, as I and others have pointed out, that is precisely the tactic of the tobacco companies at the time. Find a few doctors, either on the payroll or just with an eccentric theory to flog, to say that there is no evidence that cigarettes cause cancer and therefore the whole idea was "controversial" and "by no means settled science". At the same time, try to poke holes in the whole idea of "medical science", broadly implying that these "ivory tower eggheads" were so full of themselves that they were given to grand pronouncements in incomprehensible jargon, so to hell with them, anyway.
That latter tactic, by the way, was designed to exploit the animosity of "regular joes" towards "intellectuals", who were understood to be untrustworthy and "out of touch".
Exploit ignorance, in other words, to protect profits. Use the less well educated to drive "public opinion", which already tended towards an anti-intellectual bias.
Personally, I think we should just stop teaching science in our public schools altogether. That way, when we are told that "cause and effect" are largely unknowable, on account of how complicated everything is and all, and that is why things like disease and environmental degradation might be on account of clear cutting and dioxins in the drinking water, it also might be God's way of telling us we're just getting too big for our britches, we can all just stand around slack-jawed and say "Gosh! That kinda figures! I know I couldn't figure that stuff out, and I surely do not want one of them white coat fellas that think they're so smart telling me no different! Let's just wait and see what happens!"
And when the hammer comes down we can humbly ask God what we have done to displease him.
Points made:
-- The 70s were the beginning of a growing awareness of human driven climate change.
-- While there was concern that "global cooling" was underway, the larger sense was that gross changes were being effected, without knowing what the outcome would be.
--Popular press descriptions of global cooling left out that sense of uncertainty, and caveats that are typical for science. Basically the research was saying "We think global cooling is underway, but we're not sure because the larger processes aren't that well understood. We are pretty sure some kind of large scale change is underway.
--The role of greenhouse gases was just starting to be understood.
--The consensus shifted fairly quickly from cooling to warming models, as more attention and research began to move to human driven climate change, and the role of greenhouse gases were factored in.
Now, when you link to something that purports to show how silly old science got it wrong, so how can we know they aren't getting it wrong again, that is, in fact, "mocking", Chris.
It's mocking because it substitutes "gotcha" for any awareness of how science works, how consensus is built and what it looks like.
Will climate science change its model again? It might. Will it turn out that cigarettes don't cause cancer? Maybe. But linking to medical journals of the 60s that are ambiguous about the cause and effect and mechanisms of that process doesn't make that any more likely, and it doesn't indicate that medical science is an ad hoc affair that might say one thing today and another thing tomorrow.
Although, as I and others have pointed out, that is precisely the tactic of the tobacco companies at the time. Find a few doctors, either on the payroll or just with an eccentric theory to flog, to say that there is no evidence that cigarettes cause cancer and therefore the whole idea was "controversial" and "by no means settled science". At the same time, try to poke holes in the whole idea of "medical science", broadly implying that these "ivory tower eggheads" were so full of themselves that they were given to grand pronouncements in incomprehensible jargon, so to hell with them, anyway.
That latter tactic, by the way, was designed to exploit the animosity of "regular joes" towards "intellectuals", who were understood to be untrustworthy and "out of touch".
Exploit ignorance, in other words, to protect profits. Use the less well educated to drive "public opinion", which already tended towards an anti-intellectual bias.
Personally, I think we should just stop teaching science in our public schools altogether. That way, when we are told that "cause and effect" are largely unknowable, on account of how complicated everything is and all, and that is why things like disease and environmental degradation might be on account of clear cutting and dioxins in the drinking water, it also might be God's way of telling us we're just getting too big for our britches, we can all just stand around slack-jawed and say "Gosh! That kinda figures! I know I couldn't figure that stuff out, and I surely do not want one of them white coat fellas that think they're so smart telling me no different! Let's just wait and see what happens!"
And when the hammer comes down we can humbly ask God what we have done to displease him.
They spoke of the sayings and doings of their commander, the grand duke, and told stories of his kindness and irascibility.
They spoke of the sayings and doings of their commander, the grand duke, and told stories of his kindness and irascibility.
i dont think you're even trying anymore. stick your frickin head in the sand.
