The Washington Post has a very interesting commentary posted today by H. Sterling Burnett. I'm sure the wingnuts on the extreme left are going to respond purely with derisive comments along the lines of "you can't believe him, he's a global warming denier!" - but such comments would not actually dispute his core points (something very common in this trumped-up "holy wars"). Essentially, his commentary boils down to two key points: the current IPCC reports are victim to politicization and bad science, failing to follow even the most basic requirements from statistical sciences, among other things (e.g. the fabled "hockey stick" graph that has since been retracted by the IPCC).
I don't find this article surprising in the least. Lomborg talks to this in his book (sort of). What's interesting is how the hockey stick graph is continued to be used by prominent people like Gore when it is now known to be wrong. The corrected graph does still show an increase in mean temperature over time, but it's not nearly as severe as the wackos would have you believe.
Unlike some, I don't attribute this to being a transitional generational issue, but rather attribute it to the modus operandi of a given generation. Specifically, the baby boomer generation has been, for the most part, all about big liberal causes (if you haven't noticed), from fighting racism and gender discrimination, to abortion rights, to the political correctness movement, and now this environmental pseudo-crisis. What's particularly ironic is that these movements are almost always framed as a false dichotomy, when the reality is much less easily defined. Moreover, they are all universally turned into holy wars, on the basis that if you don't give into their perspective, then you're evil, wrong, and could lead to the destruction of [fill in the blank].
In fact, case-in-point, CNN.com today has this article on melting glaciers, in which it quotes the U.N. Environment Program as warning: "Glaciers are shrinking at record rates and many could disappear within decades..." Given that recorded history is only around 150 years in length, does this statement really have the weight of drama that the article implies? We have no reliable measure (ice core samples aside) of knowing how much of a record this rate of melt-off really represents. It's sensationalism at its worst.
What I find even more interesting about these different issues is that they're almost always self-serving, not based on good ethical discussions. Abortion: it's all about the woman, not the unborn child (talk about hypocritical from a human rights perspective). Gender/racial discrimination: it's rarely about equity or equality, but revenge on the patriarchal, generally white, segment of society. Global warming: it's all about competing corporate interests, and not about doing what is best for humanity (as outlined in Lomborg's book).
So, no, none of this surprises me one bit. It's ultimately about corruption, power, and greed. :S Some may argue that I'm throwing the baby out with the bath water, but in this case, if that baby is a bunch of agenda-motivated extremists who are not interested in making fair, scientifically-sound arguments, then I say toss away.
