uncle

Disclaimer:
Any scientist who reads this post will likely roll his/her eyes at the naivity and shallowness and the gross "duh" factor. Forgive me. My middle name is Pollianna. Whatever. Plus, this blog is my personal journal as a way to stay in touch with my family and friends, rather than a science-based blog, as many of yours are. You and your blogs are needed and I thank you. I'm just an everyday kid working as a scientist but mostly working on being human and blogging about the journey, so I'm coming at it more as an individual and less from the science perspective. Not that interesting for you, but hopefully OK for my 1-8 readers. Any non-scientist will wonder what I'm going on and on about. Any global warming denialist will simply not believe me (as is the norm). Bear with me. I just need to get this out, and then I'm done with this.

I've not written many recent posts about global warming. This is because it exhausts me . I have still felt compelled to discuss the (ridiculously recycled) issues that continue to appear and reappear amongst the ardent crowd of folks who do not believe that global warming or climate change is occurring (I give myself permission to grossly generalize this group of people here for the sake of brevity. What shall I call them? "Deniers?"). Ultimately, what a waste of energy. This is a very small (albeit very vocal) minority on the global scale, and the per capita energy expenditure required to communicate with them tops out because I have found that they are persistently unwilling to engage in any kind of civil discussion...And that is what I have been unwilling to admit until now, and why I am so exhausted by this subject. Oh naivety. I had this ridiculous optimism that given enough perseverance and decency, civil discussion would ensue and understanding would blossom throughout the world. Silly, silly me. So much for us all holding hands and singing Kum-by-yah (my second reference to that song in just a few weeks...I have no idea why).

I would be more than happy to listen to ideas and concerns and partake in a civil discussion, and in fact view that as part of my job. I'm willing to do my part. In fact, I've spent a lot of time reading through the litany of "issues" with the research that are repeated around the blogosphere amongst this crowd and spending time finding reasoned responses to the more credible sounding arguments. (I can take a guess as how many of the "Deniers" have spent a comparable amount of time reading up on the published and peer-reviewed research that supports human-caused climate change. The number is tiny.) You give me any denialist "news item" or any "new finding" (ha), and I dare say I will be able to give you a reasoned, credible argument based in scientific study to show the flaws in such finding, or show you the blatant misrepresentation of data to come up with the findings. It's REALLY not hard. It is, however, time-consuming because I try to come at it with a clean slate and open mind, but that is ultimately ridiculous because no one is going to listen to me.

Here's the real problem. These folks aren't total idiots. They are, however, unwilling to open up and listen, and this is ultimately because they view climate science as having a political agenda. I can partially understand their point, though they are completely wrong. Yes, a large portion of PhDs and research folks are of the liberal persuasion on the political scale, and a large portion of the deniers are very, very right-wing conservative. I can understand the skepticism.

But here's the rub. Science itself is not political. (duh) It's really not. Despite political leanings, despite economic status or gender or race, the scientists I know (and I know a lot of them) are totally focused on finding out how things work. We are trained to look for flaws in any argument. When I have a paper to review, I try to find the chinks in the armor. I feel successful if I do find one. I won an award for a paper where I corrected some flawed arguments that had been published earlier. Science is absolutely relentless - to portray scientists as blindly following a political agenda and participating in any kind of conspiracy is so absurd that I have no words. I have never known a more diversified, more argumentative, or more open-minded crowd than scientists. To characterize scientists as collectively bowing to any overarching agenda, much less a vast conspiracy, or to politicize science completely misrepresents its entire definition.

In addition, I have to say that I work at a research institution where there are probably more researchers on the politically conservative side than not (it's not typical). Yet not a single one of them doubts climate change. This is because when you strip the issue of political colors and are willing to really study the science involved, it is overwhelming. Science is not a matter of interpretation. It is what it is.

But the deniers have decided to believe otherwise, and no amount of energy that I can expend is going to convince them that this is not the case. That totally sucks, and I have decided that it is not worth my time or energy to continue in this. There are some great scientists out there who are good at this (some of which are in my blogroll). But I'm don't have the energy.

It's so much more useful to spend my energy discussing and debating responses to the changing climate, or discussing aspects of the economic impacts of various courses of action and find ways to mitigate adverse impacts (no, I am not ignorant of the possible economic shockwaves that could resonate across the globe if we act drastically and without thinking). I'd prefer a vigorous debate over new energy sources. I'd mostly prefer to discuss aspects of my own research (understanding fast photochemistry in today's atmosphere based on regional observations from aircraft campaigns), but the number of people who would find THAT compelling are - uh - somewhat limited.

I guess I'm crying uncle. I thought there was a place to meet where open dialogue could occur with these folks. I was wrong. Maybe the right answer is to admit to myself there will always be a contingent that will persist in believing that science is really only a political tool, and move on. There will always be that component that will persist in convincing themselves that the world is being duped by a vast conspiracy, and that they are ultimately the only ones with enough fortitude and intelligence to know otherwise. How ironic that those who claim that they are the special few who are smarter than and are above the general "hoodwinked gullible" public are really only those who are the most closed-minded, the most misled, and the most deluded.