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Science Forum Index » Environment Forum » Skeptical Environmentalist Vindicated!
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| David Naugler |
 Posted: Wed Dec 17, 2003 3:21 pm |
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From:
http://www.techcentralstation.com/121703F.html
Skeptical Environmentalist Vindicated!
By James K. Glassman Published 12/17/2003
The Danish Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation today
severely repudiated a board which, a year ago, had judged "The
Skeptical Environmentalist," the best-selling book by Bjorn Lomborg,
"objectively dishonest" and "clearly contrary to the standards of good
scientific practice."
Lomborg's book -- with 2,930 footnotes, 1,800 bibliographical
references, 173 figures and nine tables -- powerfully challenged the
conventional wisdom that the world's environment was going to hell.
When it was published in English in 2001, the book, published by the
distinguished Cambridge University Press, was praised in The
Washington Post, The Economist and elsewhere.
That reception provoked panic among radical greens. In early 2002, The
Economist reported that "Mr. Lomborg is being called a liar, a fraud
and worse. People are refusing to share a platform with him. He turns
up in Oxford to talk about this book, and the author… of a forthcoming
study on climate change throws a pie in his face."
In January 2002, Scientific American magazine published a special
section titled "Science Defends Itself Against 'The Skeptical
Environmentalist.'" Articles by perfervid critics of Lomborg covered
11 pages. All this attention, however, served merely to boost sales of
the book, which nearly two years after its publication still ranked
first in its category on Amazon.com.
Then, in January, came what enviros figured would be the coup de
grace: a report by the Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty
(DCSC). The report was, to be charitable, a piece of junk, but its
conclusions, coming from an official body, were nonetheless given
prominent display in world media. The New York Times headlined its
page 7 story by Andrew Revkin, "Environment and Science: Danes Rebuke
a 'Skeptic.'"
Now, the Danes have issued a well-deserved rebuke to the rebukers.
The Ministry of Science characterized the DCSC's treatment of the case
as "dissatisfactory," "deserving criticism," and "emotional." It found
that the ruling was "completely void of argumentation."
No kidding. The DCSC simply relied on excerpts from the Scientific
American smears. The only other evidence came from Time magazine.
In its conclusion, the Ministry sent the case back to the DCSD "with
an injunction that the DCSD should allow itself to be advised by the
Danish Social Science Research Council in matters regarding good
scientific practice. In summary, the Ministry must also state that, in
its opinion, the treatment by the DCSD of this case deserves
criticism."
The ministry's decision is the latest in a series of setbacks for
environmental radicals in recent months. I just returned from COP-9,
the big United Nations conference on global warming, held in Milan.
Never have I seen enviros so dispirited or in such disarray. The Kyoto
Protocol, which requires severe cutbacks in carbon-dioxide emissions,
is clearly dead. The Europeans are still waiting for the Russians to
ratify the treaty. Instead, the Russians are making the most cogent
case, intellectually and economically, against it.
Meanwhile, new reports have repudiated Michael Mann's "hockey stick"
theory of sharply rising temperatures, a mainstay of warming
enthusiasts; have shown that the last century was not particularly
warm in comparison with other, pre-industrial periods; and have made a
strong case for solar activity, not human intervention, as the main
factor in warming.
Earlier, the U.S. Senate soundly defeated the McCain-Lieberman bill,
which would have foisted a "Kyoto Lite" on the United States. The bill
lost despite the fact that Sen. McCain sold it as costing just $20 per
family (a study by Charles River Associates found otherwise, but the
green propaganda made the bill sound not disruptive at all, and still
it lost).
And now, the vindication of Lomborg -- the mild-mannered statistician
who simply said that the emperor had no clothes. |
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