Effectively a firm rebuttal of the idea that just because of a few poorly-worded emails from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia the entire climate science paradigm (or even the broader scientific establishment) has collapsed, the author highlights the vital work of scientists and the robustness of the system within which they work.

In the Hollywood version of how science influences policy, the brilliant scientist has a eureka moment in the lab and calls the president, who promptly dispatches a square-jawed hero to save the day. In the real world, both science and politics are enormously more complicated.

It is in this real-world context that we must place the imbroglio surrounding the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s research. Breathless media claims that the scientific consensus supporting the reality of climate change and its causes has collapsed are simply untrue.

At its heart, the debate centres on the role and process of science in creating a platform for human progress. If anything has been “revealed,” it is the challenge of communicating complex science to a media world that requires scientists to reduce their research to a sound bite.

I highly recommend reading the full article.

In a recent landmark court ruling on the issue, Mr Justice Michael Burton ruled that environmentalism had the same weight in law as religious and philosophical beliefs and granted Nicholson leave to appeal. Nicholson’s solicitor, Shah Qureshi, said:

“Essentially, what the judgement says is that a belief in man-made climate change and the alleged resulting moral imperative is capable of being a philosophical belief and is therefore protected by the 2003 religion or belief regulations.”

I can’t help feeling that this is a strange judgement. I can understand that Nicholson may feel that he was unfairly dismissed from his job, and taking this to court would be appropriate for him in that regard. What I struggle with is why he is happy for his environmental views to be put on a par with philosophical or religious ones. If the evidence for man-made climate change was vague or sparse then his belief could possibly be seen in this way. However, there is a huge amount of evidence out there, and Nicholson’s belief is simply a rational one. Don’t get me wrong, the evidence is not 100%, and there are some dissenting voices – but there is evidence none-the-less. Nicholson’s stance on man-made climate change is a perfectly reasonable conclusion to arrive at. Labelling it as a religious – or even a philosophical – belief implies a ‘choice’, a ‘decision’ to believe something for which you cannot claim to be objectively true. Nicholson didn’t just decide that he liked the environmental ‘philosophy’, he came to a conclusion based on evidence. It’s not like the evidence is hiding either. It’s not buried in the mists of time with only a few manuscripts to shine a light on its possible existence. It’s happening here, now.

The responses to this story in the media have been varied and complex. Everyone seems to be annoyed, but for different reasons. Christian groups have reacted angrily to their beliefs being equated with Environmentalism, some claiming that this “was further evidence of Britain abandoning its Christian heritage”, as if an association with green issues would somehow deliver the killing blow to a successful 2000-year-old world religion. In scouring the media at the time, I could find no mention of what these groups (fringe groups for the most part) thought of the environmental issues themselves, or of whether Nicholson was unfairly dismissed. They seemed to just be bothered about their beliefs being equated with something non-religious. Environmental campaigners were also annoyed about the pairing up of religious and green beliefs, though their stance was more an objection to science-based conclusions being equated with faith-based beliefs. People who simply weren’t that fond of the green campaigners came out with the odd comment along the lines of “Well, they are a bit zealous, aren’t they?” (suspiciously similar to the snidey comments strongly religious commentators often say about any atheist in the public eye who dares to be even remotely forward about it). Away from the fray, some lawyers were worried that this case would encourage more claims of a similar nature to go to court, potentially undermining the 2003 religion and belief regulations.

I think the fears over legal consequences are quite telling. Once you get past all the posturing, could this all simply be an example of opportunism by some lawyers? Is there no issue here at all, except that a winnable case was noticed and took advantage of? Should we be worrying about more opportunist claims being made rather than about whether belief in man-made climate change is the same as belief in a God? No-one’s attacked religion here; and the climate change issues are the same as they were before this story broke.

To bring this to a close, let’s remember what Nicholson’s job was. He was a sustainability officer. Green issues were part of his remit. He claims that he was being prevented from doing his job properly because his beliefs weren’t respected; yet his beliefs were part of his job description, and he should have been allowed to do his job to the best of his ability. If he isn’t doing his best to create sustainability at work, then he’s not doing his job. Beliefs don’t come into it. Surely the issue is one of unfair dismissal, but not on the grounds of any religious discrimination? Maybe Nicholson was being over-zealous (pun not intended) in doing his job, but still the issue is not one of religious discrimination, it is purely related to the job itself.

One of the incidents discussed in the trial concerned Nicholson’s boss accidentally leaving his Blackberry phone in Ireland after a business meeting. Ignoring Nicholson’s proposals (presumably part of his job as sustainability officer), his boss promptly sent a member of staff back over to Ireland on a plane to pick up the Blackberry. Now, his boss  may say: “well, I don’t believe climate change is man-made, so I don’t believe planes and their carbon footprint are a problem”. But what is the point of employing a sustainability officer, then, if not to reduce the company’s impact on the environment by lessening its carbon footprint? The effect of humans on the environment is implicit in the appointmet of such a job position in the first place.

It sounds a little like he was fired for doing his job properly. If I had been Nicholson, that would, for me, have been a more satisfying judgement to have recieved at the court. Not that I had been discriminated against on the grounds of my ‘religious’ belief. It undermines Nicholson, it undermines the legal system, and it undermines the seiousness of the issue of climate change.

People go about their daily lives making decisions on the basis of beliefs about the way the world works. Their epistemological framework is a complex architecture of foundations and interconnecting supports on which rest concepts held to be “true”. While some beliefs may have little consequence for the person holding that belief, others have the potential to seriously impact the lives of both the believer and, through the actions that those beliefs precipitate, the rest of mankind. When we come to examine issues of such magnitude, we see a difference between the beliefs held by the general public and those which are held by the majority of experts in the respective fields. To understand why this is the case, it is informative to consider two claims that have been made in recent years and the variation in the reception that each has received from the public. 

Claim 1: “The measles-mumps-rubella vaccine causes autism”

The origin of this claim has been buried under the weight of subsequent newspaper stories which have clouded the issue. In 1998, an article entitled “Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis, and pervasive developmental disorder in children” was published in The Lancet. This snappily-titled paper, without providing anything beyond circumstantial evidence, suggested that research should be carried out to investigate a causal link between the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Parents of the 12 children involved in the study blamed the vaccine for the development of the pathology on the basis that the onset of symptoms occurred soon after vaccination. Dr Andrew Wakefield, the lead author of the paper, urged caution in the use of the MMR vaccine and recommended that single vaccines for each of the three diseases be used until further research had been carried out, a recommendation not supported by his own paper.

It came to light later that Dr Wakefield had received considerable funding from lawyers seeking evidence against vaccine manufacturers and that he had attempted to take out a patent on a vaccine that would be a rival to MMR. These conflicts of interest were not declared at the time of publication of the paper though they would have formed part of the basis for an editorial decision on its suitability for publication. After the media coverage, the percentage of children being vaccinated at the appropriate time dropped year-on-year from 92% in 1995 to 80% in 2003 before gradually climbing back to 85% in 2007. MMR uptake has never reached the 95% threshold suggested by the World Health Organisation to provide herd immunity for the population. Measles infections increased to the point at which in 2008, for the first time in 14 years, measles was declared endemic in Britain (i.e. the disease is self-sustaining). More than two-thirds of all mumps infections recorded between 1996 and 2008 (43,378 out of 64,168) occurred during 2005.

Claim 2: “Anthropogenic factors cause global warming”

That the climate is warming is now beyond doubt. The causes of this current phase of environmental change are extremely complex, though strong evidence exists for a link between atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations and the rise in temperature. Subsequent work has implicated a range of other factors including aerosols, methane, albedo effects and fluctuations in solar radiation as contributing to the observed pattern. Climate projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggest that temperatures could rise by between 1.1 and 6.4°C by the year 2100 depending on sociopolitical factors.

It is difficult to overstate the strength of the consensus on climate change science. A staggering list of bodies of professional scientists have issued explicit statements confirming their support for the views that (i) unequivocal warming of the climate is occurring, and (ii) the majority of this warming is anthropogenic in nature. The number of scientific papers confirming these findings provides an intimidating prospect for would-be students in the area. However, despite this there is still a substantial portion of the general public holding the belief that the current phase of warming is due solely to “natural causes”.

Public reception

Here we have two claims: the first published by a scientist possessing a strong agenda and with almost no evidence that was followed by a sound debunking from the scientific community (notably in the same issue of The Lancet as Wakefield et al.’s original paper), and the second with mountains of evidence and a minuscule number of qualified dissenters. It is possible to quantify the difference in beliefs held by the public relative to the scientific establishment in each case. The wording of the IPCC shows at least 90% certainty in their statement that environmental warming is anthropogenic in origin. This is in contrast to a 2008 Gallup poll which found that only 58% of the public believed that “human activities” caused “increases in the Earth’s temperature over the last century”. In the case of MMR, a poll carried out by the Florida Institute of Technology found that 24% of respondents believed that “because vaccines may cause autism it was safer not to have children vaccinated at all”, with a further 19% “not sure”7. This is compared to a scientific community that can be assumed to be unanimous in its non-belief in a link between vaccination and autism, given the complete absence of data supporting that link8.

The role of scepticism

Scepticism should be a tool through which we view the world but it is important to be pragmatic in our use of this tool. The most extreme form of scepticism simply plants the practitioner in an epistemological quagmire where all interpretations of observable data must be made individually by that person. Clearly this is not a practical application of the principle. Instead it is obvious that we must occasionally take the interpretations and opinions of others as a basis for our own epistemological framework. While this seems reasonable it also means that the truth of our own beliefs hinges on the choice of whom to trust. Two recent sociological changes have occurred which have made this decision more complex.

The first is that the popular media moderates what the public hears, collectively acting as a filter by which only the most sensational opinions are broadcast. The shift in purpose that has gone on in the media from informing its audience to entertaining its audience brought with it the drive to find those fringe elders who will retain the semblance of authority but generate maximum audience figures. Dr Andrew Wakefield and Dr David Bellamy (a notable climate change sceptic who once described global warming as “poppycock”) are “men-in-white-coats” wheeled out to drive up audiences regardless of the resulting decline in the level of scientific understanding of that audience.

The second sociological change is the “celebrity culture” in which we now live. This has made it possible for ignorant members of the public to hold forth on important issues and garner great followings in the process. Jenny McCarthy, a C-list actress, is the figurehead of the anti-vaccine movement; Oprah Winfrey, the world’s wealthiest woman, has advocated a range of questionable health treatments; the late author Michael Crichton was a renowned climate change sceptic. Such characters are given airtime and column inches in abundance to espouse their views, regardless of how accurate those views are.

Intellectual laziness is also an important issue. While I have already stated that listening to a certain amount of expert opinion is a necessary epistemological concession, the most pressing issues (particularly those with potentially life-threatening consequences) require that the general public delve deeper themselves. Data that can be used to investigate either of the issues outlined in this essay are readily available to any interested parties. The Mauna Loa Observatory’s carbon dioxide monitoring data can be downloaded, as can the UK Meteorological Office’s climate data. The Health Protection Agency has data on cases of measles, mumps and rubella, as well as vaccine coverage, to emphasise the importance of vaccination compliance. Anybody investigating the MMR issue could even read the following sentence in the Wakefield et al. paper from The Lancet:

“We did not prove an association between measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine and the syndrome described”

Conclusion

The gulf between public opinion and scientific consensus is due to the general public not knowing whom to trust and when. The decision of when to resort to expert opinion and then which sources to use in gathering information is a complex matter and there is an element of trust that needs to be exercised. Greater efforts need to be made to ensure that those involved in the media reporting of these kinds of issues are held to account for the abuse of the confidence that the public places in them. In addition to being misleading, such reporting can also endanger lives. Science is a fascinating topic in the hands of a skilled journalist and does not need the kind of selective, sensationalist reporting that is so prevalent today.

It is a simple deal that works greatly in our favour, yet humans in our infinite wisdom like to casually piss on it. Much like the bloke that stopped his car in the centre of my road yesterday daytime, got out and relieved himself on his own car, then got back in and drove on. This isn’t relevant by the way, it just pissed me off (no pun intended). Back to my original point… Depending on which climate experts you speak to, we’re either on the verge of messing up our planet, or are pretty much already in the red. The time to do something about it is right now, not tomorrow or when the mood strikes: right now. We might not be able to completely reverse the effects, but there’s still the chance to lessen the effects. There are, of course, self-proclaimed ‘sceptics’ claiming it’s all a bit of a mountain made out of a molehill and that everything will be fine some undetermined time in the future (when we’re all dead, probably). I would claim that the evidence for severe and destructive climate change is nigh on conclusive, and that the nay-sayers are simply burying their heads in the sand like environmentally averse ostriches, but then I’m not a scientist. However, the information is out there for all to find, and it’s building all the time. Seek and ye shall find. Who do you think I am, Al Gore?

Our species has developed a dirty habit; the global equivalent of a school pupil sneaking behind the bike sheds to choke on a Marlboro. But it’s not all bad news. All we need is to get every developed nation to stop producing so much CO2 and everything will be ok (ish) again. Simple! Let’s give ourselves a biscuit!

Of course, it’s not that simple at all, as is painfully obvious. Trying to get the big, lumbering governments of the world to do anything at a decent speed is like poking elephants with matchsticks. Eventually, the elephant may stir, but only when it feels like it, and it won’t be anything to do with your matchstick. Then it will stamp on you.

It’s easy to lose faith and give up; but not everyone does. Some people try to solve the climate change problem in ever more increasingly bizarre ways. In the second episode of our podcast, Skeptics With A K,  we covered the story of Danish academic Bjorn Lomborg’s completely bonkers idea of creating a fleet of 1,900 wind powered ships, which would criss-cross the oceans forever, spraying seawater into the air in order to create a giant sun-reflecting cloud. Lomborg, a man previously known as a bit of a climate change denier, seemed to think that combating global ‘warming’ was simply a case of cooling the Earth down a bit. Well, sorry Bjorn, it’s a bit more complicated than that. For one, the Earth isn’t the same temperature all over. Cooling us down isn’t going to solve the problem. In fact, suddenly cooling the Earth down will probably have the same effect on global weather as global warming is having. The point of climate change is that it affects the weather in all kinds of extreme ways. It doesn’t work the way you imply in comments like this one:

“While warming will mean about 400,000 more heat-related deaths globally, it will mean 1.8m fewer cold-related deaths.”

Bloody hell, Bjorn, the Earth isn’t a seesaw. And what do you mean by “cold-related deaths” anyway? It’s not like we were all freezing to death until the day we started manufacturing CFC areosols. The number of people dying of, say, pneumonia isn’t going to dramatically alter in tandem with deaths from sunstroke. Weather is going to go bonkers: extreme heat, extreme cold, hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, that kind of thing.

Secondly, the plan still leaves us with all that darn CO2. CO2′s other big problem is increasing ocean acidification. That will still continue no matter how many daft ships we have floating round spraying water into the air. Well done, we cooled the Earth down but all the fish are dead and the human race is dehydrating into an early grave!

I suppose you could argue that at least Mr Lomborg is thinking outside the box. About several million miles outside the box, but outside the box none-the-less. And he’s not the only one. I’ve noticed many of these outlandish green ideas in the media over the last couple of months, so I thought I’d list some of them here, with their advantages and disadvantages:

Chocolate-Powered Racing Car:     Advantages: a steering wheel made out of recycled carrots, and the ability to run on waste chocolate and wine. Good for farmers and vineyard owners.  Disadvantages: it’s a waste of chocolate, and your pet rabbit might eat your steering wheel.

Sending Mirrors Into Space:     Would involve firing trillions of mirrors into space from a giant gun. Advantages: er, none. It involves firing sharp objects from a massive gun, for Christ’s sake! Disadvantages: again, lots of mirrors being fired from a gun is not generally considered safe! (Oh, and it would cost 244 trillion pounds.)

Artificial Trees:     One of the more feasible ideas; this would involve giant, fly-swat-shaped artificial trees lining the sides of motorways, which would absorb CO2 through their ‘leaves’. Advantages: they would be more effective at removing carbon than real trees, and would convert it into a form that can be easily stored. Disadvantages: disposing of the carbon would ultimately be a problem, unless you could find a use for it. People who don’t like wind turbines probably won’t be too fond of artificial trees either.

The Power of Algae:     Two ideas here. One is altering the gene structure of algae so that it effectively converts the CO2 it normally absorbs back into oil, which can then be ‘harvested’ from the oceans. The other is to lace the sea with iron filings in order to encourage the growth of natural algae, thereby increasing CO2 reduction. Advantages: it would certainly reduce CO2, though not necessarily by that much. Disadvantages: as yet, our technology doesn’t allow us to alter algae’s gene structure effectively, though we’re getting there. Algae also uses up oxygen in the water, which could detrimentally affect marine species.

Painting Roofs White:    Yeah, you heard me! Paint your roofs white and the Earth should get all cool, like it’s wearing a hat. Advantages: you won’t be able to see the pigeon crap on your roof. Disadvantages: it’s a bit rubbish. There isn’t enough houses on the Earth to have a significant effect. Plus there would probably be a rise in Rod Hull style accidents.

This isn’t an exhaustive list, but it certainly contains some of the more interesting (and ridiculous) ideas. Ultimately however, the key to combating global warming lies in co-operation and hard work from world governments. We could set up as many schemes as we want which reduce CO2 in the atmosphere, but in the long run the thing that really matters is reducing the amount we produce in the first place. Otherwise, we’re just putting plasters on an ever-growing wound. Of course, as I said earlier, persuading governments to get their arses into gear is easier said than done, but I’d like to end with one more fringe idea that at least attempts to address this:

Change the term ‘Global Warming’ to ‘Global Burning’

Yes, I know,  it’s silly, but there’s a serious point behind it. The ‘hole’ in the ozone layer was never truly a hole as such, but the idea of a hole, once implanted in the public’s mind spurred it on into successfully combating the problem. Think of a hole in the sky and your mind is instantly filled with the image of your atmosphere pouring away into the emptiness of space. It made the problem seem immediate and real. And the sad truth is that maybe climate change currently doesn’t feel real enough for governments to act. It still feels at one too many removes, existing only in far away melting ice-caps, or as tsunamis in distant lands. Changing ‘warming’ to ‘burning’ is not going to catch on, let alone change governments’ minds, but we need something which will.

Maybe this is simply a job for a really good marketing department. Governments don’t need facts – they already have them – they need persuasion. Short of waiting until the Thames is licking the windows of the Houses of Parliament, I’m afraid I’m out of ideas. So I appeal to you, the readers. Any suggestions how to put the global ‘burning’ wind up the leaders of the world?