Global warming exists, and you can help stop it

Author: Peter Viola '06

As renowned television broadcaster and defender of democratic values Bill Moyers has noted, one significant trait of the current political culture is that "the delusional is no longer marginal." Rabid ideology, feeding upon so-called "truthiness" and distortion of the facts, has moved into mainstream American debate as the illegitimate heir to public democratic discourse. It postulates fiction as reality, and twists spuriousness itself to its own defense.

Such is the tone, perhaps unconscious, of Michael Jou's unfortunate article in last week's Campus "Think about it, global warming does not exist, March 3". Written, in Jou's words, "to incite the reader to question global warming," the piece does little more than demonstrate that a French major with no real experience in the scientific study of climate change can choose to accept popular science fiction literature as fact. While I'm a passionate student of languages and literature myself, and no expert in science, I hold all such fields in high regard, and I do not like to play intellectual games by mixing them through uninformed guesswork and speculation. I find it mystifying that the author of the article could believe that environmental scientists are "off their rockers" while also believing that it is rational to view the work of the author of Jurassic Park as evidence that global warming is a "conspiracy."

But rather than respond directly to specific points made in the article, which many others are more capable of addressing than myself, I would like to clarify more generally the double-speak of such irrational thinking. The primarily non-scientific claims against the existence of global warming, like many other patently ludicrous ideologies which attempt to deny "legitimacy" to hard observation of any kind, revolve around a faulty logic of accusation: in this case, that global warming is only a "theory," and that the evidence of its effects is "biased." Of course it's a theory, and of course it's as biased as the multitude of individuals who study it from differing perspectives. But both complaints miss the point, amounting to the willful ignorance that says objective scientific truth is found in some fluffy realm where bias does not exist, and that anything termed a "theory," which by nature is a hypothetical method of explaining universal patterns arising from everyday events, must be false.

"Theories," if one may include global warming as an example, do not exist in a vacuum, nor do they need to announce themselves as the definitive Word of Truth in order to be taken seriously. They are a means to an understanding, and they survive the test of time (and attack) precisely because they prove useful to our human experience. Global warming exists, and it is real cause for alarm, but the theoretical pursuit of it through science is not - scientists are not terrorists, and education and activism on global warming do not constitute fear-mongering. On the contrary, the ever-growing movement to save this planet from the violence of man-made environmental destruction is based upon a dedication to universal human values of freedom, the right to good health and clean air and the need for a global socio-economic framework that allows everyone to live to the fullest, while maintaining the lowest possible impact on the fragile ecosystem which we all share as our living space.

As Moyers acknowledges, given the truly threatening impact of global warming, it can be difficult "to tell such a story without coming across as Cassandras, without turning off the people we most want to understand what's happening, who must act on what they read and hear." In that light, it is worth noting that Jou's article, in spite of its misguided approach, has in fact given us an opportunity for dialogue, to which these editorials in part attest. But the conversation must not stop here.

I would invite all those who rightly encourage others to "become informed" on global warming to take up their own challenge. Just this week, climatologist Michael Mann has already delivered a talk that would have been well worth attending for those unsure of what climate change means for our future. This spring, however, there will be no shortage of such related events, a good way to find out more would be through the Environmental Studies Website or, of course, to talk to your teachers. Finally, your fellow classmates are also an invaluable resource every Sunday night at 9:00pm in the Château Grand Salon, dozens of students are working tirelessly to stay both informed and active on the issue of climate change. The next time you feel uncertain about what global warming means to you, come join the discussion. You never know…you just might save the planet.