The degree to which science has been perverted in the service of personal ambitions during recent decades is truly remarkable. There are many factors and circumstances responsible for this. Government funding of research and the general deterioration in personal ethics throughout American society are certainly two of the principal contributors. Government control of most educational institutions has also had a pernicious effect. When students start life in an atmosphere where cheating and general dishonesty are the norms, their ethics often go downhill from there. Still, we must never lose our outrage concerning these circumstances. Too many scientists, honest themselves, have learned to ignore the decay that allows dishonesty to grow and prosper. Figures 1 and 2 illustrate this phenomenon for the case of so-called
Figure 1 is the surface temperature record for the United States during the past 103 years. Figure 2 is the lower-tropospheric atmospheric temperature record for the entire earth since 1958 as measured by weather balloons. The horizontal line in each figure is the mean value for the entire record. Also shown are slanted straight lines which are temperature trend lines for the indicated time intervals. These trend lines illustrate the dishonesty behind both the global warming claims and the earlier global cooling claims - both of which have been used by the same "scientists'' to call for world-wide rationing of coal, oil, and natural gas and the technologies that depend upon them.
First, notice that United States surface temperatures and global tro
pospheric temperatures are both currently at about the mean temperatures for the entire records. No sensible scientist, in possession of this data, would reach any conclusion other than that temperatures have been stable over the period of the record - with shorter term fluctuations and trends occurring as is evident. What, however, have the an-titechnologists claimed? During the 1970s they became "global coolers'' who warned of climatological devastation from the short-term cooling trend that is evident in figure 1. They blamed this cooling on human use of coal, oil, and natural gas.When, however, the trend reversed, they changed into "global warmers'' who warned of climatological devastation from the short-term warming trend that is also evident in the graphs. They blamed this warming trend also on human use of coal, oil, and natural gas.
Unfortunately for their claims, the short-term trend reversed again in the 1980s and entered a new cooling phase. Now, as is evident from their propaganda, they hope to ride out this cooling period by showing the public erroneous data and disseminating scare scenarios. At the first sign of the next warming cycle, they will announce that the long-awaited "greenhouse signal'' has been received and declare victory.
Meanwhile, a few scientists who would ordinarily never be noticed have ridden global warming to jet-setting notoriety and government grants from politicians who also stand to gain from this myth.
A group that calls itself "The Union of Concerned Scientists'' is distributing propaganda branding anyone arguing against global warming as a purveyor of "junk science.'' Vice President Al Gore has stated that all scientists agree with global warming except for a few "crazy people.'' Meanwhile, Administration hacks roam Montana's Glacier National Park bemoaning the receding glaciers (which are receding as the sun-warmed Earth recovers from the Little Ice Age).
Mediocre scientists like Stephen Schneider at Stanford are jostling for position as leader of the global warming movement - with their eyes riveted on Stockholm and the Nobel committee. This committee has already shown, by its embarrassing awards to the Ozone Three, that it stands ready to use Nobel prizes to advance the political interests of Swedish politicians. No doubt the leading global warmers sleep with visions of a trip to Stockholm dancing in their heads.
It is unsurprising that such dishonesty exists. Mankind has always been cursed with unprincipled opportunists. Depressing, however, is the toleration of this dishonesty within the scientific community.
From here, the issue can go either way. If the warmers win, science will likely enter a long period of decay during which it loses credibility and is slowed significantly. (We notice that, in its recent headlined review of America's best graduate schools,
U. S. News and World Report did not even list science as a category of interest.) Alternatively, the community of scientists - in which there is rapidly growing revulsion against the way in which science has been perverted by the global warmers - may be aroused enough to toss this baggage out and, thereby, recover its good name. The enthusiastic positive comments attached to many of the petitions that are being received by the Petition Project indicate that this issue does have the potential to rejuvenate the ethics of the scientific community.
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Vol. 25, No. 7
Newsletter: Access to Energy Newsletter Archive Volume: Issues Issue/No.: Vol. 25, No. 7 Date: March 01, 1998 05:22 PM Title: Trend Followers
Copyright © 2004 - Access to Energy Newsletter Archive
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