http://www.wyomingnews.com/articles/2014/05/30/opinion/guest_column/01column_05-30-14.txt#.U43K9yxOWM8
When all else fails, lower your standards." - bumper sticker
"Climate change" is now, and has been for decades, the rage among our so-called "intellectuals."
Too bad it's all a bunch of hooey - and even worse that the junk "science" that lies at its root now serves as the basis for federal public policy:
"President Barack Obama is about to unveil the centerpiece of his agenda to fight climate change, a much-anticipated rule to slash the emission of planet-warming gases from power plants." ("Feds push states to cut emissions," WTE, May 28.)
And the implications for Wyoming, which produced 39 percent of the coal for the entire United States and had 89 percent of its own energy generated through coal in 2012? Staggering - and all in the name of a hypothesis that is bankrupt to its core.
Science, in the minds of most Americans, still has an aura of dignity and respect that transcends any particular faith or educational background.
Indeed, devoted as it is to the analysis of the facts of reality, we can thank science - along with its sister creator, technology - for the fact that most of us aren't dead before we turn 30.
But science and the scientific method are very much the products of a rational epistemology - of a theory of human knowledge - that really didn't take hold until Galileo.
It was his detailed methods of observation and experimentation that paved the way for all the incredible advances that followed.
Today, that method of acquiring knowledge is under concerted attack - and nowhere is that attack more blatant than in the field of "climate change."
For instance:
- If it is truly power-plant carbon dioxide emissions that are driving "climate change," then why hasn't the Earth's average temperature changed in the last 15 years?
- As an example of the manner in which the "climate change" crowd conducts "research," consider this:
"'The two MMs have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the U.K., I think I'll delete the file rather than send it to anyone ... We also have a data protection act, which I will hide behind.'" ("Global warming with the lid off," Wall Street Journal, Nov. 24, 2009.)
That nugget came from Phil Jones, director of England's East Anglia Climate Research Unit, as one of thousands of emails hacked off the unit's email servers back in 2009.
The two "MMs" are almost certainly Stephen McIntyre and Ross McKitrick, the Canadian scientists who blew global warming's so-called "hockey-stick" hypothesis off the map.
That came when all the relevant data - not merely the data provided by Michael Mann, American climatologist and originator of that hypothesis (and the man Jones' email was sent to) - were considered.
- What few of the public realize, even today, is that the data from the Climate Research Unit serves as the basis for nearly all of the "climate change" climatology projections and scenarios for the last 25 years.
And that's just the tip of the allegedly melting iceberg, folks. Space limitations preclude a more detailed analysis of this "global warming" garbage. But isn't that enough?
So much for the idea that data should be repeatable, verifiable and shared among all parties.
Welcome to the new age of "science," where information is only as safe as the small-minded, agenda-driven, control-mongering, fear-pandering and truth-violating little data diddler who happens to hold it.
Objectivity and the integrity of truth? Long gone - washed away by a tidal wave of subjective supposition.
Back in Galileo's era, and for most of the centuries afterward, hypotheses were adjusted to fit the facts. Now, in a more pliable time, we reverse that process: We alter the facts to fit the desired hypothesis.
This is what happens when science is handed over to political hacks and made to serve state interests of collectivization and control.
The scientific method? That's all ancient, dogmatic stuff. We now have federal bureaucrats to ensure our interests for us instead. I feel safer and cooler already, how about you?
And more: that this state-sponsored takeover of science, originally claimed as necessary to separate research funding from economic interests, has actually had the opposite effect, is nothing short of tragic.
Or does anyone believe that competition among scientists for government grants has nothing to do with the political aims of the bureaucrats in charge of funding allocations?
And, of course, the fact that Wyoming's economy and energy production are about to be sledgehammered into pieces is pretty tragic as well.
Bradley Harrington is a computer technician and a writer who lives in Cheyenne. He can be reached at
brad@bradandbarbie.com.
Published on: Friday, May 30, 2014 - 12:13:45 am MDT
