"politicians have sought to...destroy the reputations of scientists"

[tex-wyo-dem]

How politicians intimidate global warming scientists

By Raymond S. Bradley

About this blog: Politics and science make for a dangerous brew, Raymond S. Bradley reveals in his book “Global Warming and Political Intimidation: How Politicians Cracked Down on Scientists as the Earth Heated Up,” to be released next month by University of Massachusetts Press. Bradley, director of the Climate System Research Center at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, describes how politicians who disagree with findings on global warming have intimidated him and his colleagues. In some cases, Bradley writes, prominent politicians have sought to discredit accepted research in an effort to destroy the reputations of scientists on the front lines. Here, Bradley shows some of the tactics used by members of Congress in the battle between fact and opinion.

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Imagine that an international group of scientists issued a stark warning that the world was very likely going to experience an increasing number of earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanic eruptions. And that this warning was endorsed by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and every other major scientific organization in the world.

How would the U.S. Congress respond? Would it hold hearings and invite scientists untrained in these geological hazards to testify? Would it promote the ideas of those who argue that earthquakes don’t exist? Would it invite novelists to discuss the merits of the topic? Would some Congress members sit on their hands and do nothing, urged on by the construction industry, which might benefit from all the new work that the impending disasters would bring their way? Would they go after the scientists who brought forward the warnings about the looming threats, and seek to intimidate them and destroy their reputations and careers?

This scenario might seem far-fetched, yet this is exactly the situation that has unfolded over the issue of global warming. Scientific assessments have repeatedly and consistently shown that global warming is real, and largely the result of the burning of fossil fuels. These studies also show that there are real and present dangers if fossil fuel consumption is not reduced. The dangers include an increasingly unstable pattern of global climate, more severe weather and the inundation of low-lying coastal areas (where most big cities are located) due to a rise in sea level. These changes will impact agriculture and affect the world’s poorest people disproportionately. U.S. military experts consider the changes to be a “threat multiplier,” leading to societal instability in many regions, with potentially significant consequences for national security.

<more...> http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/political-bookworm/post/how-politicians-intimidate-global-warming-scientists/2011/06/20/AGWcQReH_blog.html

[drm604]

1. What's happening is disgusting.

The whole attack on science is anti-American and a danger to our country and the entire world.

A few are trying to profit from ignorance and will end up harming everyone, including themselves.

[The Doctor.]

4. They still believe they will be able to buy their way out of the crisis.

To some extent, they can. But the more damage that is done, the less secure those who caused it will be.

[DCKit]

5. Then I would say it's past time for the rest of us to invest in whatever currency...

they intend to use to do so.

Once we're all screwn on such a basic level, the answers will be far more difficult.

[provis99]

7. America has sometimes gone through anti-intellectual phases.

We seem to be in one right now.

[kenfrequed]

2. yeah

The pentagon at one point in time released a study stating that Global warming could be the biggest national security threat of the next century due to all the displacement, famine, disease, and chaos it could cause.

[jwirr]

3. Be very nice if Current TV would give the scientists a program to

educate us on global warming, oil depletion, food shortages, etc. That would be in addition to KO.

[Kolesar]

9. Renewable energy concepts, too eom

[lfairban]

6. Upton Sinclair Quote:

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"

[happyslug]

8. This makes how the Pope handled Galieo, look supportive

Yes, the Church forbade Galileo form writing any thing about his observations with the Telescope, but the Pope NEVER said what Galileo saw did not exist. The Church said that what Galileo saw in his telescope did NOT support Galileo's support for the Earth revolving around the Sun. Furthermore the Church said it was perfectly OK to use the concept of a Sun Centered Solar System to explain how the planets moved in the sky, but that the fact that the theory explained the facts was not enough to prove the sun centered theory given the earth centered theory did a better explanation of some aspects of how the planets moved in the night sky.

Side note, most scientists of the same time period also disagreed with Galileo on that subject do to problems inherent is a sun centered system involving circular orbits. It was NOT till Keppler's determination that orbits are elliptical not circular did the the concept that the Sun revolved around the Earth finally died out even among most, but not all scientists. The final nail in the Earth Centered theory did not occur till Newton determined that the reason for the elliptical is that the Sun and the Earth and the other planets were doing circles around each other around a common center did all of the problems of the Sun centered Solar System were resolved. The only reason the orbits are elliptical is that the sun is so much larger then the Earth and the other planets so that the common center is either inside the sun, or very near the sun.

Yes, the church had grounds to oppose the Sun centered Solar System Concept, and some of its objections were found justified for the simple reason the Sun centered Concept was NOT compatible with the rule that things moved in perfect circles (A concept accepted even by the Church since Classical Greek Times).

When you compare the case for a Solar centered Solar system of the time Galileo with the modern case for Global Warming, the evidence against the Solar Centered Solar System was much more extensive and supported by much more evidence then the case against Global Warming, yet all the Pope did was tell Galileo NOT talk about the Solar Centered theory except as approved by the Vatican. The Theory itself was never banned (Through restrictions on it was imposed, to minimize its use as a anti-Catholic argument).

Among the Anti-Warming crowd today, such a level of tolerance of a theory they hate can not and has not be supported. The attack on the theory is almost NEVER on its merit, or even the small errors inherent in such a complex theory (Which is one of the reason the Church refused to support or condemn the Solar Centered theory for years but never officially after Newton), but on that the whole that global Warming is occurring and is man-made. It makes the Vatican of Galileo look absolutely tolerate of opposing ideas.