Is "Scientific Consensus" an oxymoron??

Probably not. "Business ethics" and "civil engineer" are in the same category, though...

Science works by the notions of observation, experiment, and consensus. What kills science is when people bring their political, social and religious beliefs to the table as a priori evidence, then try to prove them with science.

The idea that scientific disagreement somehow invalidates the scientific method is a false one, though. Sometimes the result of an observation or experiment can support more than one theory, and that's OK - that's when you move to the next observation or experiment, to either prove or disprove some of the various theories. And a true scientist is one who is more interested in finding the real answer than he is in defending his own idea, when it no longer jibes with all of the available evidence. And the worst scientist is the one who holds to his a priori beliefs as the sole basis for his theories, instead of scientific evidence.

I agree completely with everything but your last statement. Those who hold to their a priori beliefs as the sole basis for their theories are certainly bad scientists, but not the worst. The worst are those who accept payment to attempt to advance such positions, despite the scientific evidence to the contrary. Such people are not only bad scientists, but immoral frauds as well.

The article referenced here links to another that describes how Exxon-Mobile is paying scientists of this last type:

WASHINGTON, DC, Jan. 3–A new report from the Union of Concerned Scientists offers the most comprehensive documentation to date of how ExxonMobil has adopted the tobacco industry's disinformation tactics, as well as some of the same organizations and personnel, to cloud the scientific understanding of climate change and delay action on the issue. According to the report, ExxonMobil has funneled nearly $16 million between 1998 and 2005 to a network of 43 advocacy organizations that seek to confuse the public on global warming science.

It is to Water Buffalo's credit, I think, that he is opening our eyes to this sort of immoral behaviour on the part of corporations and fallen scientists.

A scientific consensus is reached on technical merits. Those who have a political agenda funded by oil companies should be kept out of the debate as they are really adding a bias. In truth all bias should be removed.

I guess the real question regarding the main topic of the article is how do we keep the bias out of the debate. It has been my experience that most people have great difficulty in being completely unbiased unless they are totally apathetic to the subject at hand. It appears to be a case of needing a neutral third party to take a look at both sides and render a decision. But where to find a neutral party is the question, since we all have a stake in the outcome of the debate on climate change being as how we all live on planet earth?

For the record, I have come to the conclusion that those who will ultimately decide this issue have far more influence and ability to effect events than I do. This being the case, I will simply continue to make my own opinions known as best I can, and then deal with what comes at me according to the convictions of my conscience. Time will not stop and the actual decisions taken will have their consequences and we will deal with them collectively. I think that the sooner we all recognize that we are all in this together, the better off we'll all be.

I think one factor that people forget is that scientist are people too. (At least until proven scientifically otherwise) That means that they will always have their own agenda, opinions and beliefs, and it is a very special person indeed who can regard their own work wholly dispassionately, compare it to a competitors and realise that they have a better theory. BUT, this is what keeps science honest, the continuous peer review system. Are even universities free from commercial pressure?

Well put.

There's nothing wrong with bias. The history of science is full of examples of researchers who started out to prove something that they "knew" to be correct, only to have their opinions changed by the evidence. Bias gives us a place to start looking. It's the inability to let go of a bias that's the problem.

That seems to be a contradictory statement. If there is nothing wrong with bias, why would one need to let go of it? I think that when one is biased towards or against something, it's in the face of, or sometimes in spite of the available evidence, not because of it. Being able to change your opinion when confronted with the facts indicates a person who is not biased, but open-minded and genuinely seeking to learn the truth, not "stuck on stupid". (A pithy quote I heard recently, and rather enjoyed.)

Bias is the starting point. Take, for example, Michelson and Morley. They believed that space was full of some substance called aether that allowed for the propagation of electromagnetic waves in space. That was their bias. That bias led to an experiment to measure the effect of the aether on light. The experiment led to the discovery that there was no such thing as aether.

If they had not been biased toward a particular theory, they wouldn't have tried to prove it, and in the process, disprove it.

Now, if they had been so enamored by their own beliefs that they tried to explain away or hide their famous results, then yes, that would be a bad example of bias.

I agree that the real question is how to keep the bias out of the debate. As you know, CNS is notoriously right wing, so much so that they seem to be trying to paint the centrist Union of Concerned Scientists as left wingers, astonishing as that may seem! Nevertheless, they provide a link to a more centrist article which says this:

ExxonMobil-funded organizations consist of an overlapping collection of individuals serving as staff, board members, and scientific advisors that publish and re-publish the works of a small group of climate change contrarians. The George C. Marshall Institute, for instance, which has received $630,000 from ExxonMobil, recently touted a book edited by Patrick Michaels, a long-time climate change contrarian who is affiliated with at least 11 organizations funded by ExxonMobil.

I am glad to see, Water Buffalo, that the Republican representative, Tom Davis, from your state is fed up with the kind of bias shown by the Bush Whitehouse regarding this same issue. The LA times, today, reported this:

WASHINGTON -- Following through on the Democratic Party's pledge to conduct aggressive oversight, Rep. Henry A. Waxman of California headed toward a possible confrontation Tuesday with the White House over his demands for documents that could show whether the Bush administration interfered with the work of government climate scientists to downplay the dangers of global warming.

"The committee isn't trying to obtain state secrets or documents that could affect our immediate national security," said Waxman, complaining that he and Davis have been asking for the documents for six months. "We are simply seeking answers to whether the White House's political staff is inappropriately censoring impartial government scientists."

Davis added: "We have every right to understand what the science is showing and how the administration is spinning it."

You can be proud that you live in a state where the Republican representative has the courage to take on the Whitehouse to eliminate the kind of bias you decry. I applaud your efforts and those of Representative Davis to provide a safer future for your kids.

You mention your being "reasonably objective." This stuff in CNS must send you right over the edge then. For balance, do you read the Communist Manifesto?

The first time I saw the said manifesto, I thought someone had given me a parody...

But then I thought I was watching/hearing a crude satirical* impersonator the first time I saw/heard GWB...

*I mistyped this as satyrical the first time - not so bad perhaps?

... not so bad at all! The joy of Freudian slyps.

I'll start with the last question. I read the Manifesto some years ago. I don't recall word for word everything it addressed, but I do know that it gave me the distinct impression that it is antithetical to my personal ideological opinions. I believe that free, responsible people, in a free and equally responsible society that holds it's citizens accountable for their actions are for better off than those who live in a society where the state is in total control of the smallest details of the lives of individuals. The idea of the priorty of the collective being uppermost reduces everyone's life to the lowest common denominator. Contrary to what many believe, all people are not equal in terms of their abilities and capacity for success in life. When you combine that fact with the tendency life has to present different challenges to each individual, and it's a safe bet that all of them are going to have different levels of success in terms of their level of satisfaction in life. The communist philosophy assumes that all citizens are entitled to an equal standard of living regardless of their ability to earn it. This belief creates a need for an equalizer. Enter the state. The state takes from the producers and redistributes to the less capable in order to achieve parity. The unfortunate result is that the incentive to the producers is removed and ultimately we end up with fewer and fewer productive citizens and soon, nothing to redistribute and the whole thing collapses as we saw the Soviet Union do. The truth is, as inherently flawed as people are, when given the proper circumstances and incentives, we tend to surpass even the most optimistic expectations, in general. Not only that, but when most people's needs are met, they are in a position to help others, voluntarily, I might add, and when individuals give to others of their own accord, they tend to be more generous than when forced by government "entitlement" programs. I'll grant that there are exceptions, but that's what they are, exceptions.

That should be enough on that to sufficiently clarify where I'm coming from.

My real question on the topic of "global warming" is how can an ordinary guy without a half dozen degrees to his credit and no real idea where to begin looking, go to get credible and conclusive evidence that there is a crisis and that we are the cause of it? I have heard a lot of rhetoric from both sides of this debate but so far I haven't seen either side present, for general public consumption, conclusive and compelling scientific data that prove their case. Hence we, the general public are left with opinion and assertion from each side and we are at the mercy of the side with the best marketing strategy. Can someone characterize this debate differently for me, by presenting some conclusive evidence one way or the other?

Might a published graph of best estimates of rate of warming at the various times that warming occurred be convincing? If so, can someone help?

We agree on the Communist Manifesto. When you wrote "I believe that free, responsible people, in a free and equally responsible society that holds it's citizens accountable for their actions are far better off than those who live in a society where the state is in total control of the smallest details of the lives of individuals," you could have been spelling out my own thoughts, word-for-word. We should agree, then, that we need to get big government out of our bedrooms, and give women control over their own bodies. An obvious area in which we have to agree is to guarantee the same rights, such as marriage, to gay couples that we do to straight couples. We are also probably both equally infuriated when government puts religious warning stickers of science textbooks, impeding the ability of our youngsters to be well-educated and responsible. If all of us could agree on just these three issues, imagine how much legislative wheel spinning we could avoid. We could cut head count in the legislative bodies in half, dramatically improving productivity.

Re global warming:

For ordinary guys, there is no better info source, in my opinion, than Wikipedia. It is constantly being edited and corrected, and anyone with a computer can make changes to any of the articles. If an article is clearly biased, it ends up being marked as such, and is corrected by someone who cares. Standards for providing (and making public) backup sources are much higher than for media at large -- which often only vaguely refer to sources, or even worse, rely on "unidentified sources." And, of course, a huge advantage over print media is hyperlinking: you can go as far into a topic as you want. With climatology, you can follow the links far enough into the subject that you start to feel as if you should be a climatologist to keep up, at which point you can either back up a little, or press on, and do some real study.

Over the last 45 years, there has been greater and greater consensus on the causes of global warming, among scientists. The supposed "debate" over global warming exists only in the minds of politicians and pop culture TV station hosts of Fox "News."

The work of science is not all about "debate" (in the pop culture sense of the word, where one group shouts at another, in hopes that the "result" will boil down to a popularity contest). Most scientists are not so far from the nerdy stereotype: they simply go about their work huddled over ice samples, running computer simulations, etc. Any "debate" over global warming is like that over genetics or evolutionary theory: the principals are well known, the science points convincingly in one direction, but the details are being worked out constantly, as with all science (still, we don't really fully agree on the nature of our most obvious force, gravity.)

Thus, the IPCC just revised its assessment of the human cause of climate change from "likely" (60 - 89% certain) to "very likely" (90+% certain). Few scientists are engaged in debate over global warming, with their discussions instead being the kind of obsessive-compulsive stuff scientists get involved in all the time -- it is their nature to be very number-driven and precise; so to them, going from 85% certain to 92% is a big deal, whereas for ordinary folks, either one means that the human cause of global warming might just as well be considered a fact, in the same sense that we consider F=MA to be a fact, or in the way we consider 9.8m/sec² to be the acceleration due to gravity.)

So the short answer to your question, "how can an ordinary guy without a half dozen degrees to his credit and no real idea where to begin looking, go to get credible and conclusive evidence that there is a crisis and that we are the cause of it?" is to search for "global warming" on Wikipedia, read through as much of that as you can, and then read the IPCC report (which will be available on line, soon) if it is not already. If you fail to do that, then you have to rely on simply guessing or following one herd or another herd: you will have abdicated your responsibility to your kids.

Al Gore has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for doing just what you claim is needed: for general public consumption, conclusive and compelling scientific data that prove their case. His film makes loads of valid points. But being designed for general public consumption, it is dumbed down -- it has to be: the public is not a bunch of climatologists. So to act responsibly, (given that, for our democracy to work, we need an educated populace) then you must go beyond the film and do the research.

Can you reasonably argue that the general population should be able to do brain surgery?

I apologize for my lack of clarity. I should have written..."free, moral, and responsible people"... That should clear up my views on the issues of gay "marriage" and abortion. If not, homosexuality is an abomination and abortion is murder. Lest the pendulum swing the other way, let me also say that we all commit equally heinous sins against God every day, but let's call things what they are. Sin is sin.

since there are about 10,000 or more religions with different gods, all of who hate each other and and some acts are sins to one god and acts of benificence to others, I tend to feel the entire area of religion is a complete fraud.

The whole concept of soul and after life etc, is another fraud by religion as a control mechanism based on fears propagated by religion...why? ..They get free food and a place to live and some people looking uo at them....but not me.

When you die, you are gone forever, nothing remains but the elements you are made of and they in time are recycled. No god,, no nothing.

We eat meat made of cells and thus we have murdered our food. Does lettuce have feelings? Stray cells of humans and animals can be killed at will, ever germ cells. men waste 500 million or more sperms cells per week, all killed, all a potential human being as they have the full complement of DNA to encode a person (if twinned and placed in a cell shell.)

sins are nothing but transgressions of rules created by men. If men as a society(and that includes women) want to call overtime parking a sin and make you pay $10, that is fine, but it is just a rule for social gathering

aurizon,

I think that is a rather cynical view. You don't have conclusive evidence one way or the other, so why believe that there is no transcendent aspect to our life? If there is no afterlife then you have neither gained nor lost anything by choosing to believe that there is, all is completely pointless after your annihilation. On the other hand if you are wrong, and you don't find out until after you die, when it's too late to change your life, what then? I know by your own statements that you think all religious belief systems are frauds, but suppose any one of them that teaches about an afterlife and judgement is correct....? I would encourage you to give some more time to reflecting on this topic.

For the record, I don't make a habit of hating any person. On the occaision that I have a lapse in that stance, I am wrong and need to repent, but that doesn't diminish the standard. I do, however, hold certain behaviors to be worthy of condemnation (as stated in a previous posting), but it's the behavior that's hated, not the person who chooses it.

Aurizon - I really don't know why I'm joining this diversion. However:

If we accept that you mean what you are saying, then the only constraint on your personal behaviour would be that you must not be found out in your "sins" against society. We could take that even further, that discomfort and pain don't matter anyway, so nothing matters at all. And yet, from what you write in other areas, it would appear that you do care about society, and even regard work and attempts at truth to be important.

It happens that I share this view - and the search for truth forms part of the basis for scientific consensus (so perhaps this is somewhat relevant after all). On the other hand, I accept that there is little rational basis for believing that we are rational. Describing this in quasi-rational terms - even memory and thus apparent correlation between theory and experience could well be a delusion, and merely part of our developmental heritage. Similarly, we behave as if we value our culture and ourselves, and other life-forms to a lesser extent (we still eat, unless you've found a solution to that little problem).

In summary, I believe I have made a pair of joint and possibly self-contrary decisions -
on the one hand, to try to think in terms of what is demonstrable, and
on the other, to try to live according to a code that I view as decent and honest.

This scarcely seems a reasonable basis for lording it over those who add the belief in a god or gods to the second half. Nevertheless, I find it impossible to respect certain aspects of some beliefs - those that place revelation above experience and measurement; I also believe these aspects to be dangerous to what I regard as society, especially those that would compel all humanity to be members of their particular sect*, or that would rewrite history or science according to revealed precepts. Obviously, we need to coerce such people to join the fraternity of rational scientific agnostics....

Fyz

*At the moment the most prominent seem to be some extreme pseudo-Islamists, but Christians and others have had similar issues at various times.

Fyz

Let us not think we only behave rationally and societally if we are under the thumb of some religious edicts. For too long religion seems to trumpet that we will all be unrestrained animals without their big stick in reserve.

People are capable of functioning with no religion at all controlling their lives. look at Europe and the UK, with about 3-5% church attendance.

Have you heard of the flat earth society? How much respect do you give their beliefes? I for one feel most of them ate just larkers.

In the same manner I believe none of the religious mumbo jumbo from the 10,000 lesser and major cults that infest the minds of man. Even less do I feel I have to respect their beliefs in any way. Mano a mano I can respect a man or woman, but as soon as they reveal they feel they operate under the control of others I feel I have no desire to enter a dialog with a slave, let me see the owner. This owner or god, somehow is absent. I do see, however, numerous minions of this owner, who seem to benefit from the work of these slaves, money, girls(or boys in the case of RC priests), nice houses and toadyism.

They on the other hand are not similarly contrained to believe our non religion and feel they must heap scorm and calumny on all non believers, even to the death in many of these sects.

Most oif the christian religions had their reformations and the power of the cults has declined. Many others have not, of this group the muslims have had the least reformation. Islam is intensely supervisory. A whole group of people who are micro-managed from birth to death by mullahs and the parents as home mullahs, tp the point where they believe it all. This is why the USA has such trouble in Iraq and why the Iraqis are unable to defende themselves.(at least partly).

A good part of the problem is the Soviet Training that the Iraqis had that diecouraged any initiative at all. Follow orders, not tactical training was given necause the Soviets dared not educate the rank and file soldiers in tactics....just offivers got that.

This is why Arab armies fare so poorly. An arab soldier with no orders does nothing. A US/Israeli soldiers has tactical training and will improvise at the one man or squad level.

I mentioned the previous as it fits in so well with their religiuous training. It ill fits them as soldiers, but fits them well as suicide bombers.

Can you imagine a greater antireligious act?......

In any event, no, I feel no respect for religion and people who cower under it's control.

Hi Aurizon

Your post reads as if you had read something entirely different to what I thought I wrote. Remember that some religions actually value free will (full freedom is difficult to align with the concept of godly reward, and that is what initially dissuaded me from religion, but that is by the way). Jesus recounts the (older) parable of the talents - that is definitely not an encouragement to slavish and unenterprising behaviour.

The idea that religions see animals as unrestrained seems pretty strange too. Again, the Judao-Christian traditions are full of reference to the social behaviour of sheep, although the latter does rather go over the top on their merits, I feel.

So, we agree that god-given religion is unnecessary for functioning - but I suggest that in practice we have substituted some equally unproven set of values by which we try to live our lives. I'm not saying that that is undesirable - in a sense it is necessary, but the chances are that these values are either inbuilt (like sheep??) or ingrained during our youth. If you have found a moral code that has a better basis, that would be a great topic for discussion.

BTW, it doesn't seem relevant to this thread, but there was a Flat Earth Society during the 1960s that was very different from what is described in Wikipedia - very much a forum for free discussion, including undemonstrated (but not necessarily undemonstrable) concepts, and adopted its name as an ironic statement. My mathematics tutor (a dynamicist whose interests included relativistic modelling of the solar system) was a member of this version, and recommended it to his students, but I was too busy following up my other interests (don't ask). I wish I could find some reference to this group.

Fyz

Yes, I am going to leave off any religious stuff, as they may wish all forums to stay within topic. I once started a religious topic to get people talking about it in a forum, but the admins canned it.

I remembet that FES, it was for people who thought 'out of the box', as it were.

To this day I think all the FE Societies are tongue in cheek, as no doubt remains

Hi Fyz.

You wrote: If you have found a moral code that has a better basis, that would be a great topic for discussion.

I am probably among the worst here at dragging religion into discussions, sometimes by engaging (maybe even "baiting") someone like Water Buffalo, who brings religion into every post, simply by virtue of his tagline. I think that Water Buffalo is probably well-intentioned, and he probably makes positive contributions to his community. But I think his desire to deny segments of our population basic human rights is reprehensible. And his views are, I believe, informed by his religious tradition – a tradition which may have some positive values, in spite of the obvious bigotry. But the absence of religion, as practiced by our US founding fathers Jefferson and Franklin, also has some positive values, without carrying along the bigotry.

If you read religious texts literally you can find many references that seem to support treatment of others in ways that can only be described as barbaric. Throughout history, horrible crimes of all sorts have been committed in the name of religion. (Granted, it's virtually impossible to make this case against Buddhism.) Slavery, in the US, was strongly supported by southern churches, and many "religious" people argued that whites were "helping" blacks by enslaving them. Churches fought women's suffrage. Even today, many Christian sects actively repress women, and many lag far behind industry in putting women into positions of authority. Amazingly, most Christian churches favor denying homosexuals ordinary rights. (They are perfectly happy to marry murderers – and even – gulp – CEOs… but they will not allow two women to marry, a legal act that favors stability in families.)

On the other hand, if one reads religious texts less literally, one can find in them some generally "good" advice: things we can all agree to, regardless of religious viewpoint -- atheist, agnostic, Buddhist, Catholic, Jew, Muslim, alike. "Thou shalt not kill." "Do unto others as you would have them do unto thee." "Act with Loving Kindness" "Good thoughts, good words, good deeds" "Judge not, lest ye be judged" etc.

Robert Fulghum, a Unitarian minister, wrote "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten." I think he's got it right -- namely that there are essential principles of moral behavior that we all learn early on, regardless of our religious orientation. Share. Don't hit. Don't shout. Help others. Treat others as you want to be treated. Be polite.

Some religions reinforce the values we learn in Kindergarten, but in practice, many do not. In practice, many religions actively seek to divide us rather than helping us to live in peace. (Thus, "Infidels" and "Heretics" and "Untouchables") In practice, many religions force rigidity and dogma upon their adherents and seek to force others to take up a particular world view, as well. Many people from other religious traditions would find Water Buffalo's tagline vaguely offensive. It appears to be commanding them to praise his lord. But those in his tradition, I suspect, think that his tagline it is just fine – they are unconcerned with how it makes others feel. (What would Jesus think?)

It is difficult to make the case, I think, that the Judeo-Christian religions offer moral guidance equal to that offered in Robert Fulghum's book, let alone superior.

What on earth could any of this possibly have to do with scientific consensus? Perhaps a great deal. There are those who will deny scientific consensus when it conflicts with strongly held beliefs to the contrary. So when one believes that the earth, plants, animals, the planets, etc. were all created in six days, then science of any type, consensus or not, becomes suspect. When one believes that Christians of George Bush's ilk are morally superior, then they tend to believe that his world view is likewise superior. Therefore, there can be no scientific consensus on the causes of global warming, because George says there can't. When science says that homosexuals are not deviants or psychologically disturbed, then science must be wrong, because the bible suggests otherwise.

Why should we care? Because these thought patterns, left unchecked, resulted in stickers on my child's textbook that say "This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things." The intent of the sticker is not to open minds but to close them. If that were not the intent, the statement would appear on every school book, and would read "This book may present theories. Think about them and evaluate them." But no – the stickers ore only on those books that describe evolution, because bible thumping literalists feel threatened. Bad science education = bad scientists and engineers. That's why CR4 participants should care. Real science has helped in thousands of ways to reduce suffering in this world. Squashing science in the name of religion is among the worst of sins.

There is a good deal less "tolerance" in your post than I am encouraged to exercise by the principles of my "religion. I for one, am very grateful for the comforts and improvements in in our lives that have come from advances in technology due to scientific research and experimentation. The fact of the matter is the evil done to man by man has no relationship to science or religion. You say that people use religion to control other people. The only common element between those who would do the controlling and those to be controlled is that they are all people. Some are more ambitious than others and would even think that they are superior to their neighbors. Joseph Mengele was not motivated by any religious ideology, quite the contrary, he was purely a scientist pursuing his experiments to increase his knowledge of his chosen field of study.

Religion is a control mechanism thought up by men to allow other men to live free and control others.

We see this in simple tribal 'religions' and the complex one we have. At the base they are just a scheme.

A recent one is scientology, another one is islam, judeism and so on

Each one feels it is right and the others wrong. How do you feel about scientology?

I would have to read some on it to answer that. At this point I don't know enough about it to give you an informed opinion. I'll get back to you in a day or so.

Here's a question. If, as you say, all religions are schemes, how did you come to that conclusion, and how do you know you are right? Is there some emperical data which you have studied which leads you there? I'd be interested to see it.

having read and seen assorted religions, including scientology, and having seen how they are all correct, all the only game in town. They all want money and they all tell you what to do and think. All 10,000 of them.

They use the money and the actions of those that are told what to do to sell the scam and raise money, so I see it as a pyramid scheme.

But you are free to spend your time and money as you wish, as are all people.

I am very glad that as people smarten up religion steadily declines. Here in Canada 75% of churches are gone as they cannot find enough suckers to pay the freight.

Some egregious sexual scandals involving little boys seems to have had the correct amount of influence and caused these various churches to sell their assets to try to repair the damage.

The only religions that grow today are the very intensely supervisory and coercive ones. islam is one of these. The micro-manage people from a very young age to make they good little disciples, much like the jesuits "give me the child, and I will own the man' concept.

Be glad to see the last one goe

Aurizon - the fact that ambitious and evil people make use of every available mechanism to pursue their ends does not of itself make the mechanism evil. You can regard religion in general as a delusion; you may even regard organised religion as dangerously prone to exploitation (although not-yet-organised religion has perhaps an even worse record in recent times). However, the way you express your concerns is not likely to convince anyone of anything - other than that you have a strong emotional objection to the whole area. Atheism too is a religion - and one that has been organised in the past (communism is a reasonably recent example).

Regards

Fyz (determinedly agnostic)

Yes, altruism exists. I have seen so much nasty behaviour under the cloak of religion that I automatically wish to deny it space to exist.

Then learn from the established religions, and cloak your objection in a veil of reasonable cooperation

To be or not to be.....

No need to apologize. I'd assumed that you meant both moral and responsible. 87% of us consider ourselves to be safer than average drivers. I the same way, most of us consider ourselves morally superior to others.

Wouldn't it be easier if there were only absolutes in the world, only black and white and no shades of gray. Instead of thousands of different religions, philosophies, and cultures, just one. Fortunately, we have the advantage of being able to learn from history, and we can see that philosophical and religious rigidity, and the inability to see or appreciate complexity, creates great suffering for mankind.

For you, treating homosexuals as subhuman seems morally righteous. To me, it seems morally reprehensible. I suspect that the 650,000 people killed in Iraq on our president's orders may be of little concern to you. To me, it is morally reprehensible. Very likely, on moral issues we will never agree. But perhaps we can agree that if we don't have the time or energy to fully evaluate the level of scientific consensus on an issue, then we should at least take the time to read the summary reports, and take it on faith that these people, far better educated than we are in their fields, are probably better able to judge the scientific merits of a position than we are.

I think it's better, when needing brain surgery, to have faith in a brain surgeon than in a butcher.

Have faith.

Apologies, I seem to have strayed off-topic again.

Raw data absorbed is knowledge. Knowledge related to other knowledge is understanding. Understanding tested by time is wisdom. And wisdom is humankind's closest approach to the truth.

Bob

What is consensus?

The word is often used (abused) to justify the decision of a group (committee) to overrule (ignore) the views of a minority.

That is the same as a majority vote without the formal procedures. Whereas a true consensus would arrive a decision that accommodated the minority view. Thus the minority viewer, although registering a dissent, would in fact support the decision.

On a scientific basis what is pi (Π)? For the sort of work I do 3.14 is good enough - although for real precision I use 3.142. But the memory buffs who can recite pi to goodness how many places would never agree with my version of pi, but nevertheless would support me for the purpose I use it.

I recall long ago that in a simple arithmetic/geometry exam at school we were told to use 22/7 for pi. We did not get bogged down in the accuracy and derivations of pi. We just used 22/7. I agree it might not be good enough for deep space travel.

A little research into the origins of the specious arguments presented in this article should shed some light on your question.

Those who seek to blur the lines between faith and science do a grave disservice to both.

Peace

Science is by no means a static entity, but is a dynamic ongoing search for knowledge and explanations. I agree that "consensus" is not the right word in many cases, and majority would be much better.

There is a body within that deals with theories and models that have many experiments to "validate" them and none so far to dispute them. This is the current agreed upon almost unanimously part of scientific theory, and "scientific consensus" here is a relatively strong term that is very close to the meaning of the word.

Then there is a body that deals with theories or models where it is not easy or in some cases even possible to validate them experimentally or disprove them experimentally. Much of the scientific views on global warming comes to mind. This area of science, beyond the ability to validate or disprove broad theories readily, allows for much honest (and some dishonest) debate. Here, the term "scientific consensus" has little meaning and would be better expressed as the "majority view".

Then you have the "unscientific" political or religious faith based claims, that start with a predetermined proposition and then attempt to "prove" it, by ignoring or trying to explain away everything that would contradict it while grasping at any shred of dissension on fine points or seemingly contradictory evidence. The creationism/evolution row along with some parts of the global warming scenario are examples.

What we can agree on for sure is that at any given point in time the "scientific consensus" may turn out to be flawed or outright wrong as new evidence is presented but that is not to say it should be ignored. And where it really represents only the majority view, things are far more open to debate.

In some cases, "Scientific consensus" could be "pointedly foolish" ( in Greek, oxi-moron, please see the Webster´s Dictionary), because everybody is in agreement on some scientific issue and therefore, there is not need of any consensus, as in the case of the Ptolomeic asseveration that the Sun is turning arround the Earth, that was considerd to be the truth for centuries. (I personnally think that we can consider that the Sun is turning arround the Earth, and the reverse, what I am ready to demostrate).

In other cases, even the scientists are not sure about one issue, and they agree that a certain interpretation is the best of all that have been proposed. Then, there is a real consensus. Then, the phrase is not any "oximoron".

In any case, the word oxymoron is really an oxymoron, because it is "pointedly foolish" to use a Greek word to mean something that can be said in a way that everybody will understand it. I think the word oxymoron is pretentious.

It is not alike to consider "pointedly foolish" the use by the physicians of Greek and Latin words, that have been invented, to make it easier the communication between persons of different languages, in old times, when latin was commonly used, and Greek was studied very often. .

Today, the scientists invent new words( Neo-logisms ), very often Greek or Latin or a mixture of both with english, to name something really new. For instance, "internet".

Arturo Pérez Rodríguez

Sorry for the mistakes

Remove the majority trees in the rain forest, add a lot of machinery that creates CO. Don't think we need politics to finish this story, do we?

The odd thing is arguing, or better yet, gathering scientfic consensus that nothing is happening to the environment. Give me a break!

I don't understand your point.

Nobody is in favor of what is happening to the rainforests, temperate forests, oceans etc. Some may deny culpability, but that is not saying they are in favor.

And most certainly no one is saying nothing is happening to the environment.

These issues are not simple, involving factors of greed and disregard at one extreme, and factors of subsistence and bare survival on the other. Much rainforest destruction is the result of "slash and burn" agriculture by farmers barely able to feed their families. Let's not forget the human flaw of "Do as I say not as I do (or did)".

People here live in waterfront homes, on land that was once a thriving marsh and wetlands, wringing their hands over the loss of breeding grounds of this or that animal, in some other place. They happily sit down to a meal of ocean fish while decrying the overfishing that is ravaging sea life and harming marine animals higher up on the food chain. They drive gas guzzling SUVs to conferences on alternate energy sources or ... global warming.

Hypocrisy and politics are very much at play in issues of the environment like the effects of global warming and what we should do about it ... not about whether it is happening.

I had thought that 'pointed' here meant sensible and directed, and the word 'oxymoron' was actually an example of it's meaning - a contradiction in terms. On which basis, "scientific consensus" does in my view exist. Unfortunately, the term is most commonly used by pressure-groups who are trying to push a contentious viewpoint - they will claim scientific consensus where it is at best widely disputed, and assert that none exists where there is but a small minority dissenting viewpoint amongst practitioners in the field.

Fleeing for now (I hope) from detailed semantics: scientific consensus as generally used would be the concepts, belief, and theories that are accepted by the majority of workers in the related field at any time. The validity of "scientific method", and human ability to make rational judgements based on evidence are part of the consensus - even if we don't in our heart-of-hearts believe in unbiased, rational observations or theories.

Now to some statements about where consensus may be seen to exist: the validity of basic dynamics including special relativity as a close approximation to reality forms part of that consensus - though interestingly, the breadth of that consensus is possibly as much to do with it's achievements in space exploration as with the formal measurements. Similarly with atomic chemistry, nuclear physics, and quantum mechanics (at least as far as photons). The consensus is that quantum-electro-dynamics "works", even though the theoretical basis is widely seen as dubious - and so it goes on.

In conclusion: yes, there seem to be consensuses (should that be consensi) that certain theoretical models give useful answers for the time being. Outside of the above, there are also consensuses that certain trends are real, and often even regarding their causes (but see pressure-groups above).

That's more than enough from me on this one

Fyz