Finding the Truth about Anthropogenic Global Warming: What’s the Greater Miracle?
About 40 years ago I read a couple of the philosophic works of the 18th Century Scottish empiricist David Hume (pictured). I vaguely recall his discussion of the subject itself, i.e., that according to empiricists, the human mind has access only to sensory perceptions about the world, from which our brains try to make sense of the world around us. We infer that there really is a world out there, even though we don’t have direct access to it.
The one big idea for which Hume is best remembered, however, is what he said about miracles, i.e., “We always disbelieve the greater miracle.” That’s deep, when you think about it. When you seem to be miraculously saved at the last microsecond from a car crash which would have proven fatal, you can think either:
What a bizarre coincidence. The odds against that were at least a million to one, but here I am, so lucky to be alive,
Or
I have a guardian angel who actively pulled me out of danger.
Hume said: OK, neither one of these seems likely. But you’re essentially forced to believe the one that, to you, is less unlikely than the other one.
By now it’s probably clear where I’m going with this. Each individual with even a meager education and an interest in current events faces the same inevitability when it comes to climate change. I hope readers will take a moment and look over the compilation of ideas on “global warming denialism.” In particular, please scroll down to the so-called “denial staircase,” and note that there are 11 different propositions from which to choose. A 12th is that God, not man, is the only one with any jurisdiction when it comes to global catastrophes, as this is a concept that comes directly from the Book of Genesis in the bible.
This, of course, is splitting a great number of hairs, albeit in a very interesting manner. If we want to simplify matters, we can say that we either believe one of these 12, or opt for the 13th, which is what the vast majority of our scientists are telling us: anthropogenic global warming is real and potentially catastrophic, but it’s amenable to change if humankind can find a way to turn around its production of greenhouse gas emissions.
In my estimation, the far greater miracle is that all these people all over the world, who have been studying this for almost half a century are wrong, and that a handful of right-wing U.S. senators are correct. I admit that Hume is right; it most certainly does come down to belief, but I would find it incredibly miraculous that Mitch McConnell and Jim Inhofe, men with no training in science, got all this right, and tens of thousands of climate scientists all over the world got it wrong. I find it more likely that the Earth will one day be proven to be flat.
