The Religion of Environmentalism
 

This is up at www.wanniski.com, I have no idea how long it will be on the front page and I can't figure out any other direct way to link it. I copied the text just in case.

There are two separate ideas here. The first, I think, is more important; that we should try to separate what we "think" regardless of facts from what we really "know". The more specific issue, of course, is environmentalism, which he uses as an example to illustrate his point.

I agree with him absolutely. That is NOT to say that I think environmentalism in itself is a crock; no one can deny that we sometimes do damage to ourselves and our earth through ignorance or greed. However, we must always look at the facts, and they indicate that some of our previous beliefs about environmental pollution were entirely unfounded. If so, we should move past them, to concerns borne out by facts and hard science.

What say ye? Is Crichton wrong?

Oh man, this is incredibly well written, and I agree completely. :o

Let me reach the whoooooole way over here and try and grasp that argument....
Anyway, I won't try to go fully point for point against this guy as his article is fairly long. Suffice to say:
Facts are necessary to me. I use them for every position I hold, environmentally. And the environmentalists I know, and the ones I read are the same way. They do not hold onto beliefs religiously without proof.
Instead of a point to point rebuttal I will tell you what environmentalism is to US, the environmentalists.
The world was never an eden, none of us believe that. Life is vicious and cruel, we all know that. What an environmentalist is, is a humanist. We are not so full of ourselves that we believe we can destroy the planet or destroy all or most life on this planet. Environmentalists know that whatever we can do will be insignificant in the long term. The world will survive us. What an environmentalist tries to do, is keep this world habitable to humans as long as possible. By protecting the earth, in its human stable way, we are protecting humanity. And THAT, is really what environmentalism is all about. I love the bengal tigers, I feel compassion for all animals. I want to see lush forests too. But above all, its to protect the food web, the natural order, so humans continue to thrive.

I will get to a little bit of what he said though.
DDT, he's right we have no conclusive proof that DDT is a carcinogen. But he then misdirects us by saying that DDT "does not cause birds to die." Of course not, no environmentalist ever said that. DDT concentrations in a bird deplete the calcium they can put into their egg shells. The shells are passed thin and brittle. The eggs usually break long before the embryo can mature and hatch. So, as you can see, from what he said he is right. But he does a damned good job of misdirecting the actual problem with DDT. It doesn't cause them to die, it causes them to hardly ever/never have any offspring.

There is strong evidence for second hand smoke being a health hazard. Not proven, but there are known carcinogens in the smoke.
It's a good thing for him he doesn't have the space to attack global warming. I suppose his reasoning for the vast majority of scientific bodies and related-field scientists in general who are supportive of global warming... is that they all belong to the "church of the environment."

Percentage of urban land area.. 5%... Ok, first that is true for the nation as a whole. But much of the midwest is farmland, necessarially, and alot of the rest is uninhabitable like mountains and rough and desert terrain. Now let him aggregate the northeast only and see how much different the problem is, in a region. There is also a problem with 'sprawl' which breaks up the natural areas. This becomes a problem when it splits up populations of animals or reduces range.

The sahara is shrinking, but deserts as a whole, planet wide are increasing in range.
I'd like to see his evidence for the antarctic ice increasing.
There is no known tech that can stop green house gas emissions right now. That is why we have to keep researching it.
Solar cells are promising as we are about only 20 years away, at current funding levels from being able to print them on paper using nanotechnology. After we hit this milestone it is only a matter of application to embed solar cells into our roof shingles so that each home creates almost all the power it needs.

Sure he can quote out of Nature and Science, and find things that support him. But anything he can find in those publications is heavily outweighed by the opposite side.

Damn. Objective scientific studies? Trying multiple plans to gauge how each works? Depoliticizing environmental issues? Admitting that "we" don't already know everything? Acknowledging that we are a part of nature and that it is far stronger than it's portrayed? Sounds right to me. The question is how to convince the "followers". If he's right and the followers have a personality that requires this type of rigid, unquestioning belief in a cause, then a new cause will have to be created. :)

The only valid points I got out of this were that science should remain apolitical (it largely does, when it is left to the scientists), and that extremism in any form is 'bad for business'. He paints an unfair potrait of the typical environmentalist however, a portrait that I have never encountered. He also criticizes some of the 'sky-is-falling' problems that never materialized. Here's one reason why they didn't: Because people did something about them. The reason we don't have Americans starving today? Food stamps- 20 million Americans use them, and don't go hungry. I'd go on, but since he didn't feel the need to back up his assertions with facts, why should I be bothered to refute them...

Wow.

Best thing I have read in a long long time. Its sadly true, but most people like most environmentalists are not scientists. They don't understand the limits of science and think that all it takes is a little more time and a lot of money to solve all problems.

Its a great piece of writing, but I'm afraid it will fall on deaf ears.

I've longed for this type of criticism. I couldn't agree more with him. From what I see, I can agree that environmentalism has been far too ideolized and turned into a replacement religion to the detriment of their cause. Great post. Very well written.

It's funny that usually, whenever I talk to self-proclaimed environmentalists, anything short of 100% agreement on my part is met with hostility and insults. And I'm not even trying to be confrontational - only to enter into constructive discourse. I'm glad Mr. Crichton wrote that.

Here's another perspective from Dr. Patrick Moore - one of the founders of Greenpeace who quit when the organization abandoned it's scientific interests in favor of perpetuating it's need to promote civil disobedience. Below are excerpted quotes from an interview with Dr. Moore in New Scientist.

" The environmental movement abandoned science and logic somewhere in the mid-1980s, just as mainstream society was adopting all the more reasonable items on the environmental agenda. This was because many environmentalists couldn't make the transition from confrontation to consensus, and could not get out of adversarial politics. This particularly applies to political activists who were using environmental rhetoric to cover up agendas that had more to do with class warfare and anti-corporatism than they did with the actual science of the environment. To stay in an adversarial role, those people had to adopt ever more extreme positions because all the reasonable ones were being accepted...

Environmentalism was always anti-establishment, but in the early days of Greenpeace we did not characterise ourselves as left wing. That happened after the fall of the Berlin wall when a whole bunch of left wing activists, who no longer had any role in the peace, women's or labour movements, joined us. I would go to the Greenpeace Toronto office and there would be an awful lot of young people wearing army fatigues and red berets in there...

I believe we are entering an era now where pagan beliefs and junk science are influencing public policy. GM foods and forestry are both good examples where policy is being influenced by arguments that have no basis in fact or logic. Certainly, biotechnology needs to be done very carefully. But GM crops are in the same category as estrogen-mimicking compounds and pesticide residues. They are seen as an invisible force that will kill us all in our sleep or turn us all into mutants. It is preying on people's fear of the unknown....

We need to get out of the adversarial approach. People who base their opinion on science and reason and who are politically centrist need to take the movement back from the extremists who have hijacked it, often to further agendas that have nothing to do with ecology. It is important to remember that the environmental movement is only 30 years old. All movements go through some mucky periods. But environmentalism has become codified to such an extent that if you disagree with a single word, then you are apparently not an environmentalist. Rational discord is being discouraged. It has too many of the hallmarks of the Hitler youth..."

Strawman much? I'll finish the article later but the first half was a steaming pile of crap.

Better late than never :p

Crichton is a novelist of some fame, but his opinions have as much influence on me as "Babs" or any other celebrity.

The Environmental Protection Agency was a Reagan initiative and I will always hold him in high regard for that alone. For those that don't remember the bad old days, the Detroit river could be easily set on fire, and eagles became an endangered species because they were at the top of the PCB/DDT food chain. It is still unsafe for pregnant women to eat fish, particularly salmon, but important protections have been put in place that I hope will lead to uncontaminated food sources.

I am old enough to remember that we dumped our raw sewage into Puget Sound; I am old enough to remember the pulp mills that left you gasping for breath; I am old enough to remember that people died when there was an inversion layer when rain didn't wash the air clean of our pollution. We have an inversion layer warning today.

My brother-in-law was born in Austria and has visited several time in the last decade. The rivers are filthy with human waste and clean/treated water is at a premium. Water is not wasted with hot showers every day, like we do. Austrian's fill a small tub, large enough for their feet, and wash themselves with that water. Or, so I am told.

Eco-terrorists belong in jail. Anyone claiming an ecological expertise, but are not a scientist, like Crichton, better have something better than rhetoric to back up their statements. The current administration dismisses scientific opinion for the corporate agenda and this will have a long-term cost if it is not stopped. Bush has done most of the derailing of Reagan's EPA through executive decisions (not subject to legislative vote), and legislative work via corporate donations (bribery).

Ayup, I'm angry about many things. But a celebrity opinion? Please excuse me while I drink a beautifully clean glass of water from my tap.

I didn't read the whole thing and I realize this was written 2 years ago, but this line made me laugh :
"I can tell you that second hand smoke is not a health hazard to anyone and never was, and the EPA has always known it."

While you could make a case that incidental second hand smoke is not harmful enough to justify the increased public regulations we've seen in recent years, to say it's not a health hazard to anyone makes you a crackpot in my book.

I think Crichton's problem is that he has become fanatical in his opposition to the fanaticism of the environmentalists. He talks alot about being rational and looking at things from an objective point of view, but I don't think he's been following his own advice.

Elph, I think the EPA was created by Nixon?

Excellent article.

I don't have enough scientific knowledge to have a very informed opinion on most of these environmental issues but I suspect that Crichton is more knowledgable than the average celebrity. I also suspect that the truth is closer to his analysis than that of the religion of environmentalism.

What he writes about is a BIG reason why I left post grad enviromental studies and went to dental school.

This is very true. However, Crichton himself appears to be projecting here, since his novel "State of Fear" is one of the worst offenders in the arena of politicization of science. He either does not understand the science, or he does understand it and deliberately distorts it. Either way, he himself seems to be one of the best examples of what he is criticizing in that speech before the Commonwealth Club.

a profile of crichton's dabblings in conservative-land....

http://magazine.audubon.org/profile/profile0505.html

i dont see much of anything compelling in crichton's argument, but i am curious about the basis for such appeal as it seems to have here.

i would be interested in seeing something approaching a coherent critique of the present state of eco-politics from the right---i know the general outlines of the very general attacks that you hear directed at "environmentalists" from the right pundit set---and it is the usual thing, a series of arbitrary general claims about environmentalists as some kind of fifth column, fronted by groups like the sierra club (which often gets painted as if they were some variant of trotskyism)---tactically, the focus is usually on groups like earth first---discursively the target is often peta--etc etc etc---in its generality, this narrative seems par for the course in the curious world of right politics--the usual caricatures of the opposition, the usual disregard for empirical information.

but the narrative is never explained--rather it is activated and deployed more or less readymade.

how does the notion of scientific expertise get formulated for the right?
where does the assumption about the neutrality of science come from? how is it defended?
why should anyone assume neutrality for scientists as a community, alone amongst almost all communities?

how did the opposition scientist/environmentalist get set up?
what prompts folk who oppose the movement in general to assume that all scientists oppose ecologically oriented action?
if this assumption does not hold, where does its correlate come from--that environmentalists are dilletantes who encorach upon the purview of neutral scientists?

what is the basic objection to politics that are informed by ecological considerations?

do you really have to assume that there are no significant environmental problems in the world right now to be a conservative (no global warming, no desertification, no problems with industrial waste, no problem with centralized agriculture from the enviromental viewpoint)?
on what basis do conservatives oppose sustainable agriculture, sustainable communities?
what is the alternative? "market forces"?

in a context where for 20 years it has been fairly common practice for corporations to purchase friendly researchers who are willing to build particular types of premises into their work, how did it come about that corporate sources are seen as neutral and environmentalist sources as political?

Good article. I read it several months ago. I think drudge posted it. For some reason I thought it had been posted here. oh well...

I think his depiction of environmentalism and environmentalists, esp. is quite accurate. Superbelt, you may not be what crichton describes, but you cannot deny that such people exist. I have known several hard-core environmentalists over the years and crichton is dead-on.

roach, I will be the first to admit that there are some very serious environmental problems we face today. I'm an avid fisherman and I would have to say a conservationist when it comes to our oceans. I notice the depletion of wetlands and the effects on fisheries. I also notice what a papermill does to a fishery in the river it is on. I also notice what longlines and gillnets do to our fisheries. I also think there are other ways to solve these problems without resorting to misinformation and being overcome by fear. I believe in using the market to help control pollution and depletion of our resources. exchangeable pollution permits, long-term planning, among other things. A lot of the programs we implement now are done after the fact. And a lot of the regulations we have now are relaxed for some (international paper comes to mind). I'm the farthest I can get from being anti-corporate, but I can admit it when I see it that some corperations do get around environmental protection laws. And its hardly an right-v-left problem. I don't see the dems doing any more to advance the protections of our fisheries than the right. I only see pandering.

We'll discuss this later, as I've got a lot of work to do today so I can hit the road early for the holiday. Have a nice one.

Of course Crichton fails to mention that there are crazies everywhere, on both sides of the political spectrum. You could have given the same speech on any conservative movement you care to mention, because every movement has its lunatic fringe. But that doesn't invalidate the movement as a whole.

The movement as a whole should be judged on the basis of the best arguments in its favor, not the worst. That's the fundamental fallacy of Crichton's speech.

"Anti-environmentalism" is just as much a religion as "environmentalism" is.

Perfect. I read the article, and was working through the thread trying to put words together that expressed how he's treating a minority fringe with his own fundamentalism. You did it for me.

I agree with the first bit regarding the challenges of truth vs. manipulation in this information age, and with evaluating causes and effects using as much data as possible, but the rest seemed like groundwork for another of his novels. Darken the greys to black so blanket generalizations and reactions seem justified. Good for the choir, but I thought that's what he was arguing against?

Once again, this article is a steaming pile of crap. He rambles on an on in a pretentious tone for over 3700 words and the only place where he brings up ‘facts’ that even remotely relate to environmental science are the three paragraphs that Superbelt quoted and refuted. My favorite paragraph was:

You had over 3700 words in this article. Maybe if you cut some of your BS from it you could have fit some of it in. It reminds me of Tom Cruise's infamous interview with Matt Lauer (I've read the research Matt!).

It’s just disingenuous to attack an idea by focusing on the extremes. By doing so, you never get to the heart of the arguement. If that is all you can do you really don’t have much of an argument. The fact is that environmental science has allowed us to repair lands that at the time were completely unusable. It’s also brought about huge changes in pollution prevention, fuel efficiency, and has greatly improved our health. These are facts that cannot be dismissed, notice he didn’t mention any of this.

Basically, this article was porn for the people that would prefer we let the Earth rot in favor of profits.

Most of the claims Crichton makes here are disputable at best, dead wrong in many cases. He's obviously cherrypicked his findings to suit his own goals here, something he claims to be against. Somehow he expects people to follow a rule that he himself is incapable of following.

For instance on DDT: it is still manufactured and used in many third-world nations around the world. It was banned in the U.S. not only as a suspected carcinogen, but for causing a whole slew of environmental and health problems.

After reading that, I expect his next novel to be a defense of Intelligent Design. As discussed above, his definition of "proof" seems to be extreme, and he would also say that evolution is not "proven" either. It is nearly impossible to prove with 100% certainty any causality; that doesn't mean that there isn't sufficient evidence to draw a conclusion and act accordingly.

(I am an environmental engineer, but I am not a "green".)

That was a reference to the famous 1993 EPA report on environmental tobbacco smoke which claimed that ETS was responsible for 3,000 deaths per year and considered it a Class A carcinogen. In 1995 that report was subject to review by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) which noted, among other things, that "the EPA ignored nearly two-thirds of the data. The EPA then doubled their margin of error to come up with their desired results. Even with all this manipulation, the numbers are still far too low to be considered statistically significant." In light of that and a whole list of examples of statistical manipulation in the report the CRS rejected the findings of the EPA report.

For some odd reason, this fact was given little or no publicity. In fact the EPA report is still cited as a reference to influence public policy.

In 1998 federal district court judge William Osteen made a ruling that invalidated the EPA report. "Judge Osteen determined that the EPA had "cherry picked" its data and had grossly manipulated "scientific procedure and scientific norms" in order to rationalize the agency's own preconceived conclusion that passive smoking caused 3,000 lung cancer deaths a year. In addition, Osteen ruled that the EPA had violated the Radon Act, which was the agency's authority for disseminating its "de facto regulatory scheme" that intended to prohibit passive smoking."

To this day, the EPA report remains at the foundation of public opinion and public policy.

To let you know where I'm coming from. - I'm a practicing internal medicine physician I'm not a smoker, nor have I ever been. I believe tobbacco smoke is certainly a serious health hazard, but the risks of second hand smoke is debatable (but it's certainly a nuisance). Smokers are unquestionably at increased risk for coronary artery disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and lung cancer. The EPA report about environmental tobbacco smoke was cited as gospel to me in medical school and I believed it - until I looked at the EPA's own data. You only need a basic familarity with statistics to see that the report was a sham.

In the end I'd certainly prefer to live my life without second hand smoke, but I'd rather base all my beliefs on objective, substantiated facts rather than personal opinion.

I think you're right on that. Thank's for the correction. :)

Prepare to be crucified.

that's why I got my running shoes on!

Another funny thing. You often hear Conservatives trashing celebrities whenever they try to rally for political causes. Why no such outrage from the right here? Oh, I see, that only applies to liberal celebrities.

Celebrities? Crichton isn't Tim Robbins. :)

(Waitaminit, aren't they both 6'6"?....)

Longbough, like I've pointed out with Crichton above you yourself have cherry picked evidence and seek to limit the discussion of secondhand smoke to only being a problem as a carcinogen or a smelly nuisance. What about all the other negative health impacts? Are they all the results of faulty studies?

http://www.epa.gov/smokefree/

Did you forget to disclose your position at a cigarette manufacturer or something? There isn't even mention of secondhand smoke as a cancer causing agent on the EPA page above.

regardless of your political affiliations it's not trashing if you're just contering their slogans with facts. It just so happens that most outspoken celebrities are liberal - that's a fact. If you want to "trash" a conservative celebrity - go right ahead - ... how many can you name?

Besides, there's no shortage of conservative bashing nowadays to begin with. So your statement makes absolutely no sense.

I didn't claim that ETS has NO health consequences whatsoever (If I gave that impression it was unintentional). FYI - Reactive Airways Disease (e.g. asthma exacerbation and bronchitis) are acute conditions - not chronic ones. Where the EPA was taken to task was their central claim that ETS was responsible for 3,000 deaths per year - that's the "conclusion" that people cite like gospel. Nobody is banning smoking in public because of asthma exacerbation or the possiblity of SIDS - the argument is about increasing chances for COPD and CAD.

You are absolutely right, however, in that the EPA report did not relate ETS as a cause of lung cancer - If I gave that impression I apologize. The second quote which says "3,000 cancer deaths", was taken from an article from the CATO institute - clearly an erroneous statement on the part of the writer. I just cut and pasted the quote - I should have checked it. However, that same misstatement isn't a part of Judge Osteen's statements.

Let me repeat - the only thing I said was that the central conclusion of the 1993 EPA report, that second hand smoke, is responsible for 3,000 deaths per year is a faulty conclusion based on manipulated data. If you're going to counter that statement please address the issue.

Not all beliefs grow from political agendas, buddy. So don't presume you know a thing about my politics. Show me some facts that substantiate the figues in question and I'll be happy to become more enlightened.

The obvious answer here is to ban children from public spaces, not cigarettes.

lol - I won't argue with that.

I prefer vonnegut.

What a big article of wrong.
Did someone sleep through anthropology? There are indigenous people alive right at this very moment who have maintained harmony with their environment for hunderds, perhaps thousands of years. The Sanema, a group of indigenous people who live in the Upper Caura region of Venezuela, have lived in relative harmony with the wildlife and plantlife of their various homes for hundreds of years. It was only when corporations moved in large farming comunities that the balance is being lost (as the population explodes, wildlife can no longer sustain the human population.
Strawman. No real environmentalist (or ecologist, as I like to call myself) has any illusions about the realities of nature. In fact, we propose using our current knowledge to protect humans from infectious diseases, parisitic insects, and starvation. We, at least I, do not want us to go completly back to a hunter-gatherer state without bringing back some of our great accumulation of knowledge. As someone who went on a survivalist safari of Brazil and Peru, I know what's out there. The fact is that if you're trained and instructed well enough, you can actually survive in those environments. I had a blast. My wife didnt want to come for some reason.

Just because Michael Crithon decided it was a good idea to sleep on the ground in a forest (which no one but complete amatures does), doesn't mean we'll all make that mistake.
What Michael Crichton doesn't realize is that he is actually arguing against himself. When most see that the population predictions are falling, that must mean that everything'll be allright. Actually, that speaks to the fact that it is worse than we estimated. If the population increase is slowing, it must be doing so for a reason. Enter environmentalists. No one can argue with the fact thawt the Earth can only support so many people. Eventually, after so many billion, the various ecosystems will shut down and a lot of people will die. It's similar, in fact, to the peak oil theories. Once there are a given number of people on the planet, production of food will not be able to sustain us. Once people start dying, econemies will colapse, disease will run rampant, Carrot Top will have a sitcom; basically the threat of partial extinction. One of the warning signs of this approaching is when poorer countries start to see zero population growth, and then negative population growth. Like it is right now. As the negative population growth makes it's way up from the poorere countries to the more wealthy countries, then we start to lose the cheap labor from the poor countries and we start to see the econemies fluxuate. I can go on, but I think this is starting to paint a picture.

about post 26 et al....

the second hand smoke story was interesting enough--just out of curiousity, when a conservative person thinks of "the environmental movement" where exactly does the epa fit into the picture?

while the information was presented in response to a critique of crichton's thing, was it presented to make a more general claim as well?
the presentation read as though it was--but there seems no basis for claiming that it is anything but anecdotal--and anecdotes while are often nice (dont you think?), that's all they are....usually, folk like to present their stories as "telling anecdotes", kinds of allegories or as something that indicates or points to matters of broader importance. but that is often little more than an aesthetic matter (your politics might lead you to prefer to think that story is indicative of something systematic so that you dont have to demonstrate anything of the sort--this sort of preference is alot like the question of which kind of coffee you prefer or what colors socks you like)
or vanity (it is your story after all---i of course am not exempt from either of these)....but these are not arguments, they are simply preferences.


the reason i wondered about whether this story was to have some bigger meaning lay in the interpretation given of it---that the epa "cherrypicked" information--which i assume meant little more than the study in question was shaped by an argument, which was no doubt made explicit, both in the overview and in the methodology. any argument entails ways of attributing hierarchy to information, bringing some points forward and pushing others back, yes? that would mean that any argument is necessarily about a selective interpretation of factors, yes? so the fact that there was a selection in the reports that the epa relied upon is no surprise, is it? and if there were problems with the argument that justified those selections, or the methodologies used to translate that argument into a sorting mechanism for data, surely that problem does not lay with the fact of selection/limitation of information per se, but with how that selection was done, yes?

which could be countered with other studies, based on other arguments and procedures that would engender a different limitation/selection of data and would presumably include a demonstration of the claim that this alternate argument was important, more capacious, etc.

so the problem is not the selective interpretation/hierarchization of data, is it?

but you present your argument as though it is--as if there is some alternative of "objectivity" that would--well what?--not have arguments, not be beholden to methodological choices, not involve any hierarchization of data, no inclusions or exclusions? well, if that is true, then even if this objectivity existed, it would be meaningless, little more than a polaroid--not even that.

so what are you saying, really, through the second hand smoke?

I think Crichton's next book should be Chicken Soup for the Neocon Soul.

And if he doesn't write it I will, as a parody. The first chapter will be about a logging company whose owner logs the last stand of old growth redwoods, in defiance of environmentalists. He has horrible pangs of guilt, but recovers finally when he realizes he has made enough money to send his cute blonde daughter to the best finishing school in the country, in a new Ferrari. The moral of the story: God helps those who help themselves. Heartwarming, isn't it?

I think it could be a best seller.

I wouldn't know.
My post about the EPA was made in response to a statement someone made earlier about the EPA. I thought the context was obvious since I quoted the person in my post. For the record, I never claimed that ETS had NO health consequences; I was only describing the origin of Crichton’s statement about the EPA.

You're free to infer whatever you wish from my post - that doesn't make it true. If one were to extrapolate an image of my personal politics from the nature of these posts that person would probably be wrong.

The Congressional Research Service DID conduct this review in 1995 and DID dismiss the findings of the 1993 EPA report as stated. In 1998 the statements of Judge Osteen regarding the quality of the EPA report were made as stated.

Perhaps you ought to challenge me on either the veracity of my facts or by providing an independent review that actually substantiates the EPA’s findings. Only then might your claim have merit. To say that I’m just being selective about my data without providing references of your own only suggests that you resist an honest consideration of views that contradict your personal beliefs.

Of course I could be wrong. In which case I would welcome the opportunity for enlightenment. But the quality of your response leaves nothing for me to consider.


In the realm of rhetorical exchange this common practice, but it is, at the same time, unusual and inappropriate in the field of scientific research. The quality of each scientific publication is tested on the merits of its collective data through scientific peer review. In every form of scientific research it is a fundamental principle to regard ALL data – even ones that contradict your working hypothesis. Every single important scientific publication to date is reviewed systematically by independent parties to substantiate its findings. In time the veracity of all research is established through its endurance under repeated review and under repeat of the study by other parties. As a as a piece of scientific research, the 1993 EPA report is not exempt from this process. It just so happens that this was one report that did not bear the scrutiny of peer review.

then I invite you to enlighten me. Please don’t make such claims in a vacuum. If you bring forth examples of “other studies” I promise to examine them with an objective eye. I’ve been wrong about many things before – It is not beneath me to withdraw my statements in light of stronger contrary evidence.

To reiterate a point I made earlier, I'm not a smoker nor have I ever been a smoker. I don't like to breathe second hand smoke if I don't have to. I'm a practicing internal medicine physician and see the chronic disease provoked by primary cigarette smoke every day in my patients who suffer from Coronary Artery Disease, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease as well as those I've treated with Lung Cancer. I don't like second hand smoke - but, if I'm to advocate a restriction on public smoking on the grounds of health impact I'd rather do so with objective data at hand.

longbough, my original comment was "While you could make a case that incidental second hand smoke is not harmful enough to justify the increased public regulations we've seen in recent years, to say it's not a health hazard to anyone makes you a crackpot in my book."

You seem to be making the former case, which is reasonable. Crichton is making the latter. That's why he's a crackpot.

Whatever flaws existed in the EPA report (and that is debatable), it is still ridiculous to claim that second hand smoke is not a health hazard to anyone. Even Philip Morris doesn't make that claim anymore.

Crichton is certainly wrong in stating that second hand smoke wasn't a health hazard but that's just his overstated interpretation of the history the 1993 EPA review. I was explaining the facts that probably inspired Crichton's hyperbolic extrapolation.

The simple fact is that the 1993 EPA study ERRONEOUSLY related second hand smoke to 3,000 deaths per year. The notion that second hand smoke can lead to asthma exacerbation is not in question - but this is about the extent of "hazard" demonstrated by ETS in the EPA report. However, the claim it makes relating 3,000 deaths is an ABSOLUTE CONTRIVANCE by all scientific and statistical standards.

If you conveniently dismiss this as a "debatable" issue then you're missing the whole point. IT ISN'T A MATTER OF DEBATE. The complete tragedy is that this is a FABRICATED NOTION perpetuated by a political agenda ... NOT BY SCIENTIFIC OR STATISTICAL EVIDENCE.

I first learned about the weakness of the EPA study on a television documentary. I was completely skeptical since I was taught this in medical school. Before studying medicine I was a physics researcher working for the U.S. Department of Energy - and am very familiar with methods of research and statistics - So I examined the raw data myself and was absolutely dumfounded to discover that, in fact, the 1993 EPA report was statistical hogwash (regarding its conclusion about ETS related to 3,000 deaths per year) .... this is not an exaggeration - there's no other way to describe it. I implore you, if you have, even a fundamental familarity with statistical analysis, do look at the data yourself and you will see that I'm not exaggerating.

... it's sad, but I have a strong suspicion that most people will not posess the initiative to call me on the facts but would rather hurl baseless claims about my motives.

Maximusveritas, it isn't your post that provokes my defensive reply but some of the other ones. You, thankfully have been more cordial. And I appreciate that.

longbough, he's agreeing with you. maximusveritas called your case reasonable, and I agree. It was Michael Crichton's case that was absurd and shameless. The EPA makes mistakes all the time. The fact that the EPA made a mistake does not change the fact that the article above is fillied with exagerations and erronious information. The EPA was wrong, but smoking is still dangerous and can be very harmful to a persons health. My Aunt died of cancer from smoking. My Uncle was diagnosed with lung cancer despite never actually smoking a cigarette (or being involved in any other high risk activity or vocation that is associated with lung cancer, such as working around dangerous inhalants or a lot of dust). If you ask his doctor, someone who knew him quite well and has all the test from over the years, he will tell you that my Uncle died from second hand smoke. I don't know if second hand smoke kills 3000 people a year. I do know beyond a reasonable doubt that it killed my uncle. That is enough proof for me that at least one person died from second hand smoke. This opens up the possibility that second hand smoke kills more.

I don't want to get into another big honking debate about SHS (secondhand smoke) but for longbough I'd like to point out a few things:

--the EPA did appeal the court decision against it, and won the appeal (in 2002). That judge's ruling was completely vacated. Isn't it interesting the Crichton didn't point this out?

--the EPA report did pass peer review. There were over a dozen independent scientists that approved the study. It was and is approved by the American Cancer Society, the Surgeon General, and a slew of other scientific agencies.

--it is not at all correct to say that the CRS panned the study. The CRS report simply was a neutral review of the information at the time, and it neutrally reported the criticisms of the EPA study. It did not perform any statistical analysis that resulted in any negative evaluation of the study.

--the CRS report was not a peer-reviewed published study. It was just a preliminary government report.

--there are several other studies besides the EPA study that demonstrate an increased risk of lung cancer due to SHS. Even if you completely disregard the EPA study, the Fontham et al. study, the largest case control study performed at the time, showed essentially the same results as the EPA study. Their reported median value of lung cancer deaths per year is about 2700 (if I remember right), which is not significantly different from the EPA value. There are several others in addition that corroborate the EPA conclusions.

--there is nothing unusual about a one-tailed statistical test for the effects of environmental toxins. The EPA uses these routinely and nobody questioned them in studies of other toxins. But their other studies did not involve the tobacco industry.

--anybody interested in the politicization of science in this context should consider that, if you want to predict whether any particular study is going to conclude that smoke is harmless, your best predictor is the funding source. If the funding source is the tobacco industry, then the study nearly always predicts no harmful effect. Nearly 3/4 of all studies concluding no effect of SHS were funded by the tobacco industry.

--longbough: you say you have reviewed the methods of the EPA study and found them to be completely invalid. I'm a statistician myself, and have also looked at the methods. It's a 600-page report, and I certainly haven't read every word. But I've looked at the tables and the associated methods, and these indicate to me, clearly, a very highly significant overall effect. They are completely convincing. Even if you use a 95% confidence interval, the effect is still very highly significant. If you'd like to point to me the specific passages in the report that you disagree with, I'd like to see them. To my knowledge none of the critics of this report have done this, including Judge Osteen. So I would be very interested in seeing exactly where in the report you have found any fatal statistical flaw.

Bottom line: the EPA study is just one of many, and it has been completely vindicated by subsequent research. Even if you disagree with it, the overall picture is a clear increase in lung cancer due to SHS exposure. Of course the effect is not as great as with smoking, but it is real, and it increases with exposure. This stands to reason: SHS contains the same carcinogens as cigarette smoke.

raveneye,

Thank you for your insight. You've clearly given me more food for thought - I really needed a convincing counter argument to what I had learned - and you've given me just that - in spades!

I'm glad to know the story doesn't end with the EPA report as I had understood them. As I mentioned before primary cigarette smoking is a serious problem among my patients who suffer from a variety of associated chronic conditions. I will look into the matter further and reconsider my view.

willravel, personal experiences like yours are enough to shape anyone's personal opinion. There are several forms of lung cancer - each of which is predisposed by different specific risk factors (by far the greatest being primary tobacco smoke exposure in bronchogenic carcinoma) and some of them through no known risk factors. But statistics have absolutely no relevance to an individual and personal experience - I can understand how you feel. My grandfather to whom I was very close died of bronchogenic carcinoma while I was away in medical school. I had returned to visit after his diagnosis and a partial lung resection. He had been the picture of health when I had last seen him. My stay was short. Only a week after I returned to school I received a call that my grandfather had died.

raveneye, thanks again for the information. I will certainly look into your points when I get a moment. Until then I'll have to suspend my prior statement.

Good job of breaking down the main points raveneye.

If anyone is curious, Medline or BMJ are good places to search for some of the additional studies that point out the possible hazardous effects of second hand smoke.
Just be careful to look out for the tobacco industry's studies. We know from recently released internal memos that the tobacco industry has been waging a full scale misinformation campaign against research on passive smoke similar to the campaign they waged decades ago regarding active smoking. They've funded some bad research and funded organizations like Cato and Hudson in order to trash some good research. Unfortunately, this has created an environment where anyone who comes out on the side of the industry is labelled a stooge when that's not always the case.

In the meantime, you can check out this article about a recent study that was presented at the latest AHA meeting.

. . . and just to bring this point back on topic: the title of Crichton's speech is The Disinformation Age. If you really want to discuss this subject, you can't leave out the most egregious example in the recent history of science: the tobacco industry's well-funded and relentless disinformation campaign against honest scientists trying to study the harmful effects of cigarette smoke.

You must consider the references used for your sources if you are use them to corroborate the findings of the 1993 EPA study. In a surprising number of cases you'll note the prime reference is the 1993 EPA study itself! - that would include opinions of the AHA, American Cancer Society, the American Lung Association and the U.S. Public Health Service. That's what makes it a big deal if one were to call the EPA report into question. The 1993 EPA report is a major the keystone for much of the opinion about ETS.

That is why you must check the references of whatever source you're using (including those of the AHA article mentioned above) - otherwise you could, unknowingly, end up in a circular argument. I have yet to thoroughly evaluate raveneye's post, though.

There's no question that tobbacco smoke is a carcinogen. The question remains if ETS exposure is enough to make a significant impact on one's chances for developing CAD, COPD and/or Lung CA.

I'm still at a loss to explain the following item.
In 1998 the WHO issued the following press release:
PASSIVE SMOKING DOES CAUSE LUNG CANCER, DO NOT LET THEM FOOL YOU - where the WHO uses a study done by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.

However if you look at the study itself it doesn't say that at all. Here's a link to the abstract of the IARC study:
Multicenter case-control study of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and lung cancer in Europe.
Read the conclusion -"Our results indicate no association between childhood exposure to ETS and lung cancer risk. We did find weak evidence of a dose-response relationship between risk of lung cancer and exposure to spousal and workplace ETS. There was no detectable risk after cessation of exposure."

Though it does mention "weak evidence of a does-response relationship between risk of lung cancer and exposure to spousal and workplace ETS" the statement is clarified in the the body of the publication itself where it says that "There was also a nonsignificant dose-response relationship with duration of exposure. We also found an association of similar strength with workplace exposure. Dose-response relationships were more consistent and risks were higher, although in most cases they were not statistcally significant, with combined indicators of spousal and workplace ETS exposure." Multicenter case-control study of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke and lung cancer in Europe. In other words, it has not reached statistical significance.

The WHO's press release paints a different picture when it infers from the study that "Passive smoking DOES cause lung cancer". That bothers me.

Again, I'm not trying to imply anything by calling to question common beliefs about ETS - my purpose is better described as being a "devil's advocate."

THIS is the type of discussion I enjoy reading.

Thank you everyone!

I can't say much that hasn't been said, but my 2 cents:

I run in a group of friends that consider themselves rabid environmentalists. This article describes none of them. They (we) understand the savagry of nature, animals and our fellow man. I know exactly no one that buys the 'eden' mythos Chrighton describes. He spends a huge amount of ink on that, and I have no clue where he gets that. Strange. The other issues in this have been handled better by others...

More interesting to me are those for whom this article resonated positively. There is no clearer example that I've seen lately that illustrates the gap in understanding that permeates all issues these days - from both sides. I hope this type of discussion helps fix that.

My personal dilemma is that I feel I work hard to understand where those that I disagree with are coming from. And I don't see that same effort the other way. Crazy bias on my part? I'm sure willing to consider that as a possibility.

That's called a strawman fallacy. MC tries to prove the other side wrong by misrepresenting our views and beliefs. http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html
Just keep saying it, eventually someone will listen. That's what I do.

longbough, simply citing the EPA study does not necessarily call into question any conclusions of a study; it certainly doesn't call into question the study that maximumus cited.

The WHO memo you are referring to was a response to a disinformation campaign by the tobacco industry, which touted the cited study as "proof" that SHS as completely harmless. I think you'll agree that that interpretation of the study is off base.

Anybody interested in the conclusions of the best, largest studies on this subject can check out these papers I cite below. They are a good starting point. And their conclusions are completely independent of the EPA paper, in case that matters. Note that these are very conservative studies, that include even small exposure to SHS in their risk assessment. The important result is the dose trend response, which is very highly significant. The greater your exposure, the greater your risk of lung cancer.

Brennan, P., P. A. Buffler, et al. (2004). "Secondhand smoke exposure in adulthood and risk of lung cancer among never smokers: A pooled analysis of two large studies." International Journal of Cancer 109(1): 125-131.

The interpretation of the evidence linking exposure to secondhand smoke with lung cancer is constrained by the imprecision of risk estimates. The objective of the study was to obtain precise and valid estimates of the risk of lung cancer in never smokers following exposure to secondhand smoke, including adjustment for potential confounders and exposure misclassification. Pooled analysis of data from 2 previously reported large case-control studies was used. Subjects included 1,263 never smoking lung cancer patients and 2,740 population and hospital controls recruited during 1985-1994 from 5 metropolitan areas in the United States, 11 areas in Germany, Italy, Sweden, United Kingdom, France, Spain and Portugal. Odds ratios (ORs) of lung cancer were calculated for ever exposure and duration of exposure to secondhand smoke from spouse, workplace and social sources. The OR for ever exposure to spousal smoking was 1.18 (95% CI = 1.01-1.37) and for long-term exposure was 1.23 (95% CI = 1.01-1.51). After exclusion of proxy interviews, the OR for ever exposure from the workplace was 1.16 (95% CI = 0.99-1.36) and for long-term exposure was 1.27 (95% CI = 1.03-1.57). Similar results were obtained for exposure from social settings and for exposure from combined sources. A dose-response relationship was present with increasing duration of exposure to secondhand smoke for all 3 sources, with an OR of 1.32 (95% CI = 1.10-1.79) for the long-term exposure from all sources. There was no evidence of confounding by employment in high-risk occupations, education or low vegetable intake. Sensitivity analysis for the effects of misclassification (both positive and negative) indicated that the observed risks are likely to underestimate the true risk. Clear dose-response relationships consistent with a causal association were observed between exposure to secondhand smoke from spousal, workplace and social sources and the development of lung cancer among never smokers. (C) 2003 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Fontham, E. T. H., P. Correa, et al. (1994). "Environmental Tobacco-Smoke and Lung-Cancer in Nonsmoking Women - a Multicenter Study." Jama-Journal of the American Medical Association 271(22): 1752-1759.

Objective.-To determine the relative risk (RR) of lung cancer in lifetime never smokers associated with environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure. Design.-Multicenter population-based case-control study. Setting.-Five metropolitan areas in the United States: Atlanta, Ga, Houston, Tex, Los Angeles, Calif, New Orleans, La, and the San Francisco Bay Area, Calif. Patients or Other Participants or Other Participants.-Female lifetime never smokers: 653 cases with histologically confirmed lung cancer and 1253 controls selected by random digit dialing and random sampling from the Health Care Financing Administration files for women aged 65 years and older. Main Outcome Measure.-The RR of lung cancer, estimated by adjusted odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval (Cl), associated with ETS exposure. Results.-Tobacco use by spouse(s) was associated with a 30% excess risk of lung cancer: all types of primary lung carcinoma (adjusted OR=1.29; P<.05), pulmonary adenocarcinoma (adjusted OR=1.28; P<.05), and other primary carcinomas of the lung (adjusted OR=1.37; P=.18). An increasing RR of lung cancer was observed with increasing pack-years of spousal ETS exposure (trend P=.03), such that an 80% excess risk of lung cancer was observed for subjects with 80 or more pack-years of exposure from a spouse (adjusted OR=1.79; 95% Cl=0.99 to 3.25). The excess risk of lung cancer among women ever exposed to ETS during adult life in the household was 24%; in the workplace, 39%; and in social settings, 50%. When these sources were considered jointly, an increasing risk of lung cancer with increasing duration of exposure was observed (trend P=.001). At the highest level of exposure, there was a 75% increased risk. No significant association was found between exposure during childhood to household ETS exposure from mother, father, or other household members; however, women who were exposed during childhood had higher RRs associated with adult-life ETS exposures than women with no childhood exposure. At the highest level of adult smoke-years of exposure, the ORs for women with and without childhood exposures were 3.25 (95% Cl, 2.42 to 7.46) and 1.77 (95% Cl, 0.98 to 3.19), respectively. Conclusion.-Exposure to ETS during adult life increases risk of lung cancer in lifetime nonsmokers.

I consider myself an environmentalist too.

I recall a class I had on water ecology in 1993. For some reason the professor was late, but in grad school where you have a class size of about 10-20 people maximum, you don't apply the 15 minute rule like you did as an undergrad.

I recall it quite vividly for two reasons. It was early spring, and a the first real warm day. I discovered the girl I thought was pretty cute, and would have hit on if I was not already dating my future wife didn't like shaving. She was wearing some sort of stockings/dress combination, and her hair was such that it was sticking out all over the stocking. For some reason, that image sticks in my mind. The other reason is as follows.

Well being we had nothing better to do, we started to talk about the environment, problems, and how to fix them. The conclusion reached among those of us who were talking was that the problem for the environment was specifically people. We had too many of them you see. The solution was we needed less of them, and perhaps something like an engineered virus was the best way to achieve this lower number. There was much agreement in this concept.

To me this was a turning point of such, a last straw, and a time to redirect my studies. This incident alone is rather minor, but after years of discovering the nature of the 'environmentalist' the lies, the politics, and in many cases the ignorance of the people involved, I had enough. (I could go on writing about the ignorance and lies that made up Earth Day 1991)

These types of people form the core of groups like Green Peace these days, and other organizations. I have a feeling they are now in charge of the Sierra Club as well, but thats just a hunch based on what I'm reading from them.

On the other hand there are plenty of 'good' environmentalist out there. Hunting and fishing groups have done a lot for habitat restoration, as they have a vested interest in seeing a healthy environment. Unlike some self proclaimed environmentalist, these groups don't view people themselves as the cancer on mother earth.

I'm afraid that Crichton dissapoints me as a scientist, but still thrills me as a writer. This article, as misinformative as it is, is very convincing, so it affirms his skill. Its a pity though that as a scientist himself, Chrichton throws objectivity and proper scientific fact out the window of and blatatly lies about a number of subjects (DDT, Gloabal Warming, etc).

If I had the time I'd post exactly how the Climate Change community and peer review is structured. Maybe next week.

Crichton is in fact neither right nor wrong. Crichton is irrelevant and somewhat of a red herring.

As Ustwo said correctly, most "environmentalists" are not scientists.

However... most novelists and politicians are not scientists either.

In fact there are very few scientists around. I have a science degree. I would not call myself a scientist. Getting back to the topic at hand. Crichton's contribution is to simply muddy the debate.

I do like some of his points. In particular - he is correct. Nature is not the nice safe thing that fringe environmentalists worship. Likewise - hardcore environmentalism is somewhat comparable to religion.

Crichton annoys me somewhat in linking environmentalism groups to those scientists who study the environment. These are seperate groups with different ideals and goals. In particular, scientists are generally supportive of technology. It is science that makes many technologies possible - and it is technology that makes many areas of scientific research possible.

Remember, Crichton is - first and foremost - a writer of fiction. Damn GOOD fiction, in my opinion, but still fiction. I enjoyed that article immensely, but don't agree with it 100%. However, I respect his opinion, because he is - secondly - a scientist. For those of you who "pooh pooh" Crichton as another "celebrity" mouthing off on issues, remember this:

Michael Crichton

• Graduated Harvard University, B.A. (summa cum laude), Anthropology, 1964 (Phi Beta Kappa)
• Visiting Lecturer in Anthropology at Cambridge University, England, 1965.
• Henry Russell Shaw Travelling Fellow, 1964-65.
• Harvard Medical School, M.D., 1969 (never licensed)
• spent one year as a post-doctoral fellow at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences, La Jolla, California 1969-1970

You can argue that his interpretation of the science behind the argument is wrong, but he does have the credentials to at least argue them without being belittled as a celebrity.

I've always been perplexed by how Americans put Environmental Scientists and Environmentalists in the same boat. They are two distinct groups of people. Crichton is probably aware of this, but he makes these blanket statements to generate controversy for the benefit of sales.

That's why I'm even more dissapointed in him. Charles Pellegrino is also a SF writer, who is also a scientist (in fact, there are many). Read Pellegrino's novel DUST - Its perhaps the best Ecological thriller ever written, and while Pellegrino embellishes for effect, he avoids blatatly misinforming the reading public. Crichton is well aware that lay people read his books and take what he says as gospel (pun intended). He is a knowledgeable person, who is respected for researching the premise of his novels. If Crichton had written State of Fear without adding in all the references I would have been more forgiving, but in using peer-review references his book becomes a structured ARGUMENT. And he used his reputation to mislead. I have many friends who I had to argue with after they read that book - because they accepted that Crichton is telling the truth. That's also why scientists are tearing into it.

Crichton knew this would happen. He knew the controversy would enhance publicity of his book (or at least whoever gave him the idea to do it knew). At best he was irresponsible. At worst, he's shown himself to be an anti-environmentalist fanatic.

Sorry Vaultboy but having been in the 'environmentalist' trenches first hand for a number of years, I have to say Crichton is dead on correct in just about everything he wrote. I've been there, been part of them, and turned away in disgust. You may disagree and thats wonderful but that is as much a part of science as politics. You should never argue with a specialist, but recall the history of science is littered with specialists that were completely wrong. Even empirical data can be interpreted in different ways.

He was an anthropology major. It's not like he graduated as a chemist, physicist, engineer or even a biologist.

Ok. That's a fair point. Mind you, I'd still not call him a scientist. To me that word implies a professional researcher with PhD (or working towards same) in pure science.

I quite like the speech. It's construction mixes images, emotion and a dash of reason. Clever, well constructed, appealing. There is nothing wrong with this structure in a political or general context. It is aimed at a broad audience. It is nicely done.

But... the pattern tells a sceptical person that they are being sold something. Does he really have a solid case - if so, why is he padding it with fluff? I'm not particularly paranoid - it is probably because he has an audience to entertain.

The key points made are probably not meant to be taken as absolutes, more I'd say they are logical end points in a story. Just as a film is a story meant for entertainment, so is the speech.

Ultimately, I quite liked it. The danger is that people may take this seriously. Accept the observations that he makes (stated as facts) and go on to discount evironmental agencies, environmental science and all environmentalists.

Sure... the group "environmentalists" includes a number of uneducated kooks, but... we should put this in context. Whether his claims (DDT) are correct or not is barely relevant. There have been a significant number of fairly undeniable - of environmental disasters and issues over centuries. Accepting that these occurred does not mean saying no to all development.

Methinks that mere Anthropology majors are not often invited to be Visiting Lecturers at Cambridge University. Besides, he wasn't just a "major" - he graduated with a BA in the field. He must have done something to distinguish himself enough to lecture at Cambridge.

Many people don't realize that some schools offer an Anthro path as an alternative pre-Med track. That may have been the way Crichton chose to get to medical school.

My uncle is an MD. He is also a psychiatrist. He was a lecturer at a respected northeastern university. He has treated patients, he has done research, he has written papers...he will argue that physicians can be scientists.

Anyhow, my point was not to defend Crichton's viewpoints, but to point out that he does have some educational chops that shouldn't class him as "just another outspoken celebrity".