As a recent dropout from the corporate sector, the feral attacks on climate science and the scientists themselves are quite transparent to me. What puzzled me was why this savaging seems to actually work – doubts about climate science do seem have escalated. Why?
Bill McKibben, in ‘The attack on climate science is the O.J. moment of the 21st century,’ suggests that a concerted campaign has chosen to divert attention away from the high-level clarity of climate science work, onto trivial flaws and misdemeanours. As the O.J lawyers did, the trick is to subject individuals to relentless, inflammatory attack. The seeds of doubt are sown and then grow into scepticism.
It’s worth reproducing McKibben’s mildly hopeful conclusion:
In the long run, the climate deniers will lose; they’ll be a footnote to history. (Hey, even O.J. is finally in jail.) But they’ll lose because we’ll all lose, because by delaying action, they will have helped prevent us from taking the steps we need to take while there’s still time. If we’re going to make real change while it matters, it’s important to remember that their skepticism isn’t the root of the problem. It simply plays on our deep-seated resistance to change. That’s what gives the climate cynics ground to operate. That’s what we need to overcome, and at bottom that’s a battle as much about courage and hope as about data.
To an analytical person like me, knowledge equals data plus analysis. With climate change, knowledge clearly isn’t enough.