Challenging the Consensus of the Scientific Community
Like everybody else, I suppose I have certain abilities as a person. But looking into the future and divining weird trends and fads sure isn’t one of them. If you had asked me 10 years ago if I thought a large swath of educated Americans would be ignoring the claims of scientists, and challenging the findings of the overwhelming consensus of the scientific community on a certain matter, I would have laughed at you.
Yet I ask you to check this out: We have scientists literally taking to the streets, protesting the fact that they’re being ignored.
I would have said hell would have frozen over first.
Challenging science is never a good option but challenging scientists who act like prima donnas is always in vogue.
We have scientists living high on or off the hog at tax payer’s expense. Ordinary folk see inconsistencies in the walk and talk shtik. Much as Al Gore was attacked for his lifestyle more than his message, scientists get the same treatment. I know scientists that are consistent with their global warming message and their personal lifestyle but I also know some that treat it as a job and the climate be damned if conservation interferes with a good time. This does not go unnoticed by the folks.
And, the puppet-in-charge and his wife who jets around the world on the tax payer’s dime and contributes to the climatic woes that certainly befall us…. how pray tell is he going to whip the proletariat into line when the message is mixed? One NY City date trip from the white house pollutes the planet more than the average citizen contributes in a year. Go figure! L
Now an old story, our current social constructs and etiquette have been projected into other contexts, and we have the conflation of knowledge and opinion by the masses. Those who choose to be manipulative take advantage of this particularly failed evolution in our society.
Our writings are not particularly good at creating a reasonable sense of proportion. Talk of some scientists doing their job and others being dogmatic (pick your favorite negative attribute here) gives a mistaken sense of balance. Does that give one the feeling that there are hundreds of thousands of people in the sciences doing good work and a couple dozen bat crazy ones? Of course not. We use this technique of disproportionate equivalency a lot these days in our politics, and in my opinion it is highly misleading.
Balanced reporting has become almost archeological.
Extremely well-stated and subtle, Arlene.
The Sizzle has become the product…I said that,
Greg Chick
Not to be overly contentious, I must honestly confess something. I’m continually astonished by the thought processes of five relatively small but highly vocal groups of people:
First, those who pronounce that the vast majority of the markedly intelligent, intensely reserved, closely peer-reviewed and evidence-based scientific community have been falsifying data and endangering their careers for the sake of short-term personal gain, and who yet believe that politicians are not excessively or unduly influenced by lobbying money and campaign contributions…
Second, those who claim extreme reverence for our Constitution while they champion politicians who shred our Bill of Rights in the name of “national security”, and who actively promote the establishment of theocratic principles and endorse the fraud of “corporate personhood”…
Third, those demanding less regulation of banks, insurance firms, brokerage houses and industries, and yet accept ever more interference with, control of, and intrusion into the personal lives of citizens…
Fourth, those who are deeply passionate about the preservation of an embryo, yet believe that childcare subsidies and child labor laws are a bad idea, and will surrender a newborn baby to the unchained whims of profit…
Fifth, those who fear that allowing marriages among 6% to 10% of the population who are gay will somehow threaten the existence of an ancient institution that already fails over half of the time within five years between straight couples…
However, I’m not all surprised by the decidedly extensive overlap between these groups.