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Originally Posted by Elphaba
My objection to Chrichton is not in his novel and how he treats the science of global warming within a fictional story. My objection stems from his public appearances in which he purports to be some sort of expert and provides impressive arguments to influence his audience. That he has carefully cherry-picked the evidence he presents in his pseudo role of expert makes him a political creature worthy of scrutiny and criticism.
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Bingbingbingbing!!! That's it exactly.
My problem isn't with Chrichton per se - you can't fault a guy for being self-important and trying to maximize his exposure and fame. That's small-minded but understandable.
The real problem here is the fact that most Americans are scientifically illiterate. We're talking about a population about half of whom still believe that God created humans in their present form (and scattered a bunch of "scientific evidence" for evolution to test our faith). In general, we don't know how to judge good vs. bad science, don't know the difference between correlation and causation, have no idea what statistical significance is, and are poor judges of scientific credentials and credibility.
The media are certainly complicit in this, as they make unwarranted, sensationalist conclusions from scienctific research, but you gotta blame the education system that churns out people who think that just because a guy is a "doctor" means he can speak with any kind of authority about climate research.
Scientists themselves are also to blame for refusing to speak to the public in a way that is understandable, makes reasonable hypothetical conclusions from the evidence at hand, and doesn't qualify statements six ways from Sunday. When the credible voices in research are silent for fear of being misunderstood or misapplied, you get the quacks who have no such compunction and are attention whores gobbling up the public's attention and spouting whatever nonsense they think is true or will get them funding.