Professor Schaff mentions Jonah Goldberg's devastating reply to Ellen Goodman's comparison of "global warming deniers" with Holocaust deniers. Here is Goodman's offensive passage:
I would like to say we're at a point where global warming is impossible to deny. Let's just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers, though one denies the past and the other denies the present and future.
James Tarranto of the Wall Street Journal goes further.
Imagine if someone in 1937 had foreknowledge of the Holocaust and began sounding the alarms, describing in detail what was going to happen just a few years later. Most people probably wouldn't believe him. They would be, to use Goodman's phrase, denying the future. But would they be "on par" with people who deny the Holocaust after it has happened?
That seems a stretch. There's an enormous difference between doubting an outlandish prediction (even one that comes true) and denying the grotesque facts of history. Because we are ignorant of the future, we can innocently misjudge it. Holocaust deniers are neither ignorant nor innocent (though extremely ignorant people may innocently accept their claims). They are falsifying history for evil purposes.
What is fundamentally wrong with Goodman and others who have made the same sort of comparison is that they are trying to turn dissent into heresy.
I would add a couple of things. Science is never about consensus and authority. Most great achievements in science have had to come by breaking free of the dominant consensus among scientists. Moreover, the authority being appealed to right now is an explicitly political statement. One of our intrepid readers, Dan O'Neill, makes this argument:
Since the inception of the IPCC, International Panel on Climate Change, the technical reports issued by the IPCC have been used to further political posturing and promoting of the Koyto Protocol. Usually at the expense of the technical integrity of the actual science used to generate the reports. The culprit for the misleading information is typically the SPM, Summary for Policy Makers. Since the actual scientific studies are too large and complex the UN IPCC's voice to the public regarding climate science is the politically approved SPM. The 1996 SPM included the phrase "the balance of evidence suggests that there is a discernible human influence on global climate." This claim was based on simulations of global climate called general circulation models which used only a portion of the available atmospheric temperature data. A claim that was later refuted and received absolutely to reporting from the ever diligent press. The 2001 SPM included, "Most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gasses". It is important to note the political nature of the SPMs which in this case was released before the Bush-Gore election cycle. The true conclusion of "Climate Change 2001" read as follows:
"The fact that the global mean temperature has increased since the late 19th century and that other trends have been observed does not necessarily mean that an anthropogenic effect on the climate system has been identified. Climate has always varied on all time-scales, so the observed change may be natural."
In fact some of the lead authors of the scientific reports have stated that the SPM have a strong tendency to disguise uncertainty, and conjures up some scary scenarios for which there is no evidence. The process used to produce the SPM is far from ideal and may be distorting the real messages from the available science.
I heard one of the scientists responsible for the final IPCC report say that some of the conclusions in the current Summary for Policy Makers will be toned down in the more scientific and longer version, just as Mr. O'Neill says happened with the past reports.
Dissent on both science and politics should not be stigmatized.
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