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Inhofe In a Huff About Climate

January 13, 2005

Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) is convinced that human-induced global warming is a hoax perpetrated by money-grubbing environmental alarmists. Disclosure - For the record, I have not struck it rich in the apparently well-traveled field of money-grubbing alarmism. Look at me, wearing thrift store specials and a set of drugstore reading glasses that have seen better days.

But I digress. Inhofe's latest broadside, delivered the day after the 109th Congress opened, is a garden-variety tirade that sets the gold standard for selective reporting. It makes the curious case that skeptics' doubting arguments about humanity's role in climate change outweigh, prima facie, the extensive peer-reviewed evidence that artificial greenhouse gas emissions are warming up the climate. Inhofe gives an approving nod to Michael Crichton's new bestseller, "State of Fear," in which villainous environmentalists cruise around in hybrid-electric cars, bumping off their enemies with deadly bites from ill-tempered octopuses (octopi?)

For scientists who have dedicated years of their lives to teasing out humanity's industrial fingerprint on the atmosphere, it's become all too tiresome having to refute the skeptics and the supportive peanut gallery that repeatedly trots out discredited theories and old chestnuts about climate change issues such as satellite temperature measurements, global versus regional temperature changes, probability distributions, and the like.

Tiresome though it may be, it's important for scientists who have amassed evidence for anthropogenic global warming to step outside their labs as often as practical to explain their findings to lay people, who need to understand what's happening in the atmosphere, the risks we face, and things we don't yet know.

Crichton and the others in the community of skeptics should understand that the courtroom of informed judgment is located in Missouri. Show us, with scientific rigor, that the many researchers who have painstakingly tracked down evidence for human-caused global warming have made a colossal blunder.

Scientists are not perfect. Occasionally, contrarians are right. If so, we need to know. But the global warming skeptics have yet to make convincing arguments with bullet-proof evidence. Incendiary accusations about money-grubbing alarmism don't help their cause.

What about the rest of us? Environmental advocates must stick scrupulously to the evidence and propose practical fixes for global warming that are equitable and make economic sense. Greens should spend more time talking hopefully about solutions.

Businesses, especially those that produce or use large amounts of carbon-based fuels, need to acknowledge that climate scientists are very likely onto something big. More time planning for a world running on carbon-free energy would be in order. Business can be part of the problem or part of the solution. We'll all be better off if it's the latter.

Politicians will have to answer hard questions about global warming that they would rather avoid. Also, they need to understand that science cannot provide complete information. Our elected leaders will have to use their best judgment and implement the best practical solutions -- before the next election.

We ordinary citizens must do our part. We need to pay attention to the issue, learn how science works, and dig for the information riches that are available, well beyond the he-said, she-said gruel that too often passes for news. We must hold our leaders accountable for dealing with climate change sooner rather than later.

Feedback

When I worked for Searle pharmaceuticals, I did a lot of litigation support. One of the things I saw over and over again in medical lawsuits was plaintiffs' "theories" on how some medical problem their claimant had was caused by one of our drugs, based on absolutely no scientific evidence, or very flawed scientific evidence based on misinterpretation and misuse of the literature. We had to defend against these ridiculous claims, and we had to convince juries that we were right. For the most part, we were able to do this by using good science. However, it's extremely difficult to put up a defense against ideas for which there is no scientific basis. (That's one of the reasons we need tort reform.)

It seems to me that just as Republicans fight for tort reform because of such frivolous lawsuits, we ought to be able to use a similar rationale to fight frivolous notions that there is no global warming, that slowing pollution control is OK, logging in natural areas is OK, raping the land to drill for gas and oil is OK, etc. The scientific facts are on our side; what we must do is convince our politicians that their misinterpretations of scientific facts and use of faux science is not only wrong, but harmful to our environment and our country.

Barbara Struthers
Deerfield, Illinois