First Things Touts Global Warming Denialism
Ask yourself a simple question: whenever a Catholic organization or group deliberately chooses to side with the interests of “Americanist” ideologies- materalism, individualism, nationalism, militarism– over the teachings of the Church in particular instances, is it not abundently clear where this group’s loyalty lies? Case in point: Richard John Neuhaus on the Iraq war. And now I see First Things has waded deeply into the tedious realm of global warming denialism, in the guise of an essay by Thomas Derr.
Derr’s essay is dreadful. He paints himself as an honest skeptic, not in the thrall of the oil industries, but a believer in the process of dilligent scientific inquiry. But his analysis shows total unfamiliarity with the literature, as he trots out the same tedious old stories of the medieval warming periods and mini ice ages as if nobody had heard of them before(actually, I became acquainted with these issues in Al Gore’s Earth in the Balance, all the way back in 1992). He brings nothing new to the table. Nowhere does he mention the position of the Church on global warming. Nowhere.
But what annoys me most about this essay is his complete distortion of the most important study to date on the economic costs of global warming, the UK Treasury-mandated Stern Review (see here for more details). Derr says the following:
“You’ve also been told that failing to curb our greenhouse-gas emissions will cause irreparable economic damage to the poorer nations, as the Stern Report insisted. But the report was savaged by economists. William Nordhaus of Yale is among those who fault Stern for using a near-zero social-discount rate, which would charge current generations for problems not likely to occur for two or three centuries hence. In fact, one can make the opposite case from Stern’s with greater plausibility: Economies would be wrecked by adoption of the Kyoto targets. Even a moderate stabilization of greenhouse-gas emissions would require something like a 60 to 80 percent reduction in fossil-fuel use, and standards of living would drop through the floor. Poor countries would have a nearly impossible time rising out of their poverty.”
In fact, Derr is engaging in a kind of obfuscation bordering on lying. Here is what the Stern Review actually says: By not acting, the costs of climate change will eat up 5 percent of global GDP each year, which could rise to 20 percent, taking into account a wider range of risks. In contrast, the cost of reducing greenhouse gas emissions would amount to 1 percent of global GDP a year. But what about poor countries? In fact, these are destined to suffer the most from inaction, as “hundreds of millions of people could suffer hunger, water shortages, and coastal flooding”. The most vulnerable, the poorest countries, will pay the price ”earliest and most”, even though they are least responsible for global warming. And in fact, low-lying Pacific islands today are already beaing the brunt of climate change.
And the Stern report was not “savaged by economists”. I know of two serious critics, one of whom is William Nordhaus. But look at the grounds for Norhaus’s critcism: he thinks the discount rate used by Stern should have been much higher. But the Stern Review made the choice it did on ethical, not economic, grounds. In other words, they refused to discount the future simply because it is the future. Putting it another way, they held that the welfare of future generations should be treated on a par with our own. Of course, if we argue that furture generations don’t matter as much, then of course the need to action will be lowered, as we will be paying the price and not harvesting the full reward. I believe Stern’s assumption is perfectly in line with Catholic social teaching: our lives are not worth more than the lives of those who have not yet been born. Durr seems to think otherwise. It is a selfish, individualistic position. Incidentally, the reluctance of politicians to take action is exactly because they discount the future too heavily– they do not see far beyond the next electoral cycle.
Here a quote from the article posted:
So we see First Things is not in denial about global warming. Rather their concerns are about the cause. Certainly even Morning Minion can concede that if temperatures are rising on other planets, then the sun may be most if not all the cause of current rises in temperatures. That is of course unless some materialist, individualist, militarist, Bushist and whatever other ist America is projecting into outer space is at work.
[Quotation was block quoted by editor for clarity.]
As a “science” person, what bothers me about those who deny global warming is how fiercely they deny it, which is as ignorant as those who push it as an absolute truth just as fiercely.
Based on the little evidence I’ve seen and my limited knowledge I have to discern the available data, I cannot conclude one way or the other. Same with many scientists around the world. Why would a politician or a blogger think that there is in fact such chaos lying ahead or just a huge myth?
One thing is true and cannot be denied by either side of the global warming argument is that (super)development has come at a high price and has too often ignored the long-term effects on the environment. This is what the Vatican tries to raise awareness about.
Throughout history, we have seen many civilizations destroy themselves without even knowing so…such an example is those at the Easter Island who kept cutting trees without realizing that they would be left with nothing…
Katerina,
I’m still missing where the linked First Things article denies global warming. Could you point it out please.
Just where can the Church’s authoritative teaching on global warming be found?
I don’t think there are “authoritative teachings” on global warming, but there certainly is an official position and reaction to climate change that is affected by human industry: If humans are affecting climate through industry and the possibility that such an impact will have adverse effects on the environment and peoples, then there is a moral obligation to curtail this effect.
The Holy See, from the Pope to the Vatican Ambassador to the UN, has made several statements on our moral obligations in the face of climate change. I will put a post up on this as soon as the posting slows down a bit.
This man is not a scientist and he is “selectively” interpreting data as he wishes; therefore, not very credible in my book. But hey, that’s just me, right?
Alexham,
Wrong question. There is no authoritative teaching on such a thing. There is, though, authoritative teaching on stewardship and awareness around the issue of global warming is just a small part of the greater teaching.
M and K-
That is what I thought. And I will certainly give serious consideration to any of the statements that have been made thus far by the Church on the subject.
My only point is that if one is going to be critical of a priest or a priest’s publication for taking a position contrary to the Church (keeping in mind, of course, that FT frequently publishes the writings of non-Catholics), it would be nice to have some context.
And with respect, I don’t think MM’s post does much to persuade those of us who don’t necessarily buy into the doom-and-gloom warnings touted by the likes of Al Gore (who has zero credibility with me).
In this respect, K and I are of the same mind: I just don’t think the science that is available right now is sufficient to render a conclusion about the cause of global warming one way or the other.
Katerina, I echo your comments, especially in the first two paragraphs. I think the reason people are quick to steadfastly deny climate change is precisely because of the certitude proclaimed by the *other* side. This certainly doesn’t justify “blind denial”, but it does render it somewhat more understandable.
Katerina is right.
I am not a scientist. I do not have the right to look at pictures and interpret them as I wish. On this area, I humbly accept the overwhelming scientific consensus. Of course, it may be wrong, but I am not so arrogrant as to make such a claim. Our faith is underpinned by reason. We are not voluntarists. And there can be no incompatibility between faith and reason.
I am more interested in the economics in this post, of which I have a firmer grasp. And there I can state quite confidently that Derr simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about. We need to be guided by probabilistic analysis here– the consequences of inaction are so dire, especially for the poorest among us, that not to act would be gravely irresponsible (note that is not contingent on knowing for certain).
And here we go with that “authoritative teaching” red herring again. Does it need pointing out that the Church has no competence in the scientific domain, but that it also cannot ignore it? Calling for action on global warming is an exercise in prudential judgement- the application of moral principles to particular circumstantial facts. The Church has a duty to pronounce on the moral implications of global warming, and does so. Of course, for many on the American Catholic right, “prudential judgment” means “license to ignore”. For the last thing Christianity should do is to challenge comfortable middle-class lifestyles!
The idea of ethical discounting is an interesting one, though I’m not sure that Catholic social teaching settles the issue as decisively as Morning’s Minion suggests. There is nothing inherently immoral having a particular affection for one’s family, or country, or co-religionists, even though objectively speaking their lives are not worth more than the lives of anyone else. In fact, something like ethical discounting seems to have been behind Keynes’ insistence that the long term consequences of his policies didn’t matter because, as he said, “in the long run we’re all dead.”
But again, your headline is wrong. The man is not denying global warming, only the economics of it. The Catholic position is to present other’s arguments truthfully. You have not done so.
MM-
With respect, the overwhelming consensus of which you speak is highly dubious. There are many “scientists” being counted in that “consensus” who have zero expertise in this area.
In any event, I have yet to see any real scientific evidence that humans are largely responsible for global warming, or that drastic (and ecnomically suicidal) remedies are called for at this point in time. You may buy into Gore’s hysteria, but I don’t.
I agree that we are called to be good stewards. We are not called to accept, with question, DNC talking points on every environmental issue.
I don’t like Al Gore. He won the popular vote against George Bush. He has no credibility.
From my (limited) readings over the years, it’s my understanding that temperatures are rising in our most recent temperature cycle, which is not out of step with previous heatings and coolings, and that humans are probably having a measurable effect. Bjorn Lomborg has written several interesting things about this, including some severe criticisms of those he thinks are engaging in hysteria for various reasons of self- and group- interest.
I believe our Pope is named Benedict and not Al. The term global warming denial was of course thought up by people who want to shut down debate. The resemblance to the phrase holocaust denial is not accidental. Ellen Goodman, always a class act, made the comparison directly in one of her Boston Globe columns.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=19401
This should be an issue of science and public policy. Unfortunately it has become an article of faith for many on the Left, and people with differing views are not opponents to be debated but heretics to be mocked and shouted down.
Donald,
Oh, so now the word “denial” is forbidden in the course of any debate in the English language! You would fit in very well in the left-wing campus speech police!
Semantic sleight of hand is semantic slight of hand Tony, and you’re intelligent enough to know that. When you call someone a global warming denier you are presupposing that global warming, its cause and its solution are obvious except to the willfully blind. No need for debate, we know the truth! Go argue the point with Ellen Goodman, she spilled the beans on this one.
Good point Philip. But don’t hold your breath waiting for a correction or retraction. I’m still waiting for the evidence from Katerina that Pope John Paul II opposed EWTN. She just fails to respond and then moves on and continues her ways in other posts.
oops. That’s Phillip not Philip.
MM et al.,
Y’all know how much I enjoy VN, even when it frosts me. But I gotta say, I’m pissed. We who think global warming, if occurring to whatever degree, is not caused by humankind are not hyper-capitalist obscurantists blind to the summer sun. We have damn good reasons for being suspicious of the grandiose claims of those demanding immediate and severe action to curb global warming, both scientific and cultural. Scientifically, it looks to us like the sun and not CO2 is causing whatever warming is happening. Culturally, we’re pretty postmodern in recognizing that most truth claims, irrespective of their truth or falsity, are made in the service of power. And here we see a certain section of people who seem to be wielding global warming as a weapon to advance large-government agendas.
And I gotta side with Donald on this. Being a keen student of language and rhetoric, it seems to me that calling one a /global warming denier/ evokes the phrase ‘holocaust denier.’ Can we really think of any other construction with currency in contemporary conversation that includes /[noun]-denier/? Maybe I’m overlooking something, but I don’t think so. The word is so unique it can only call up the phrase /holocaust-denier/.
And so I think such people who use that term can, in my best British vernacular, piss off. I’ve been to Dachau, Buchenwald and Sachsenhausen. Comparing us to the Nazis because we have serious, honestly held qualms about the validity of the issue and its use in political discourse is unmitigated BS.
In fact, it’s folks who are severely concerned about global warming who risk acting as Nazis, who made great advances in contraception, sterilization and abortion science. It’s no secret that many in the environmental movement consider people the problem, and thus birth control and abortion are a major part of the remedy. (Check this out from that right-wing rag, Slate: http://www.slate.com/id/2173458/) Maybe Catholics and other traditional Christians who consider openness to life and rejection of abortion and infanticide constitutive of Christian identity should be more suspicious.
Further, and finally, those of us suspicious of the socio-politico-cultural-ideological juggernaut that is the global warming machine are not in principle opposed to environmental protections and good stewardship. Many of us would love it if there was better air in cities, if Big Food would stop poisoning the populace with high-fructose corn syrup and trans fats, if corporations were concerned with humanity’s well being, etc etc. In fact, if the global-warming nuts would concentrate their efforts on local and regional issues, they’d get more traction, get more accomplished and, in doing so, probably have made strides against the specter of global warming in the process (if, indeed, we’re causing any of it at all).
OK, off to pray the Angelus to settle down…
Iranaeus,
Good post. I wish I had written it. If ever I am in Great Britain I’ll look you up and buy you a pint.
Irenaeus, well said,
MM, I have to agree with Phillip, you are clearly misusing ‘denialism’ (a frequent buzzword in this overwrought topic) because it is by now a loaded term that carries a lot of extra baggage. But most of the skepticism and ‘denial’ on the issue is directed towards the cause, not the fact, of warming. Either you accidentally mislabel it (in which case you completely misunderstand the point of his article) or deliberately do so to discredit the writer (in which case it is a poor device beneath your usual high standard of quality).
Also, I am curious why you consider ‘materialism, individualism, nationalism, militarism’ to be uniquely ‘Americanist’ ideologies — that’s an extremely absurd statement.
RM
A tip of the hat to Irenaeus, for the best comment I’ve read in quite a while.
Yeah, what Irenaeus said.
Sorry, Irenaeus, but I take issue with some of your fundamental premises.
First, I do not accept the postmodern dictum that truth claims are made in service to power. In this political debate, spin and subterfuge are indeed a constant temptation. But we must remember that the current US regime has taken this to an unprecendented level. From the outset, they claimed that, as an empire, they make up the facts. No, sorry, there is such a thing as objective truth. If we don’t fully know the truth, it is our duty to search for the truth, with all honesty and integrity.
As stated by Dignitatis Humanae: “It is in accordance with their dignity as persons-that is, beings endowed with reason and free will and therefore privileged to bear personal responsibility-that all men should be at once impelled by nature and also bound by a moral obligation to seek the truth, especially religious truth.” We must always seek the truth! How do I do that in a scientific debate? By earnestly sifting through the evidence, and placing my faith in the overwhelming consensus of the experts. if I read some basic facts about medieval warming periods and mini ice ages and the behavior of the sun, am I at liberty to form by own conclusions that so happen to fit my own ideological dispositions? No! Just as I am not at liberty to tell a doctor that his method of curing a disease is flawed, based on my reading of some fringe literature. That would be arrogance.
You even state that one reason you are opposed to global warming is because it is supported by people you do not like (supporters of contraception, abortion etc). I think Alexham claimed not to like Al Gore. May I suggest to you that your selective reading of the evidence is based on these underlying preconceptions, and is not fully open to the facts as we rational and responsible agents should be. I see no other reason why global warming denial is concentrated within the American political right (even the Tories in the UK have accepted the need for environmental action). And if your arguments have merit in the moral sphere, why does the Vatican not mention them? Why does the Vatican talk about the need for environmental stewardship to combat global warming? You claim Catholics should be more suspicious. I think you would be better served to listen more to the pope, and less to the peculiar American Protestant theology that stresses dominion over the earth and the impeding end times (if the rapture is coming, who cares about global warming?).
And no, the word “denial” is a perfectly valid English word, and I will not be subject to this kind of postmodern assault (I had enough of that in college, thank you very much). I said nothing about the nazi genocide, and this issue has nothing to do with it whatsoever.
visit a site called realclimate.org on which actual climate scientists discuss actual climate science papers published in actual scientific journals. global warming denial generally does not get past the peer review process: not because there’s a conspiracy, but because it’s bad science. we know vast amounts more about natural fluctuations in climate than we did even ten years ago, and all this goes to reinforce the scientific consensus that what is happening now is caused by us and our activities. there are even now some who argue that human activities before the industrial era have influenced the climate, such as the massive deforestation that accompanied the rise of agriculture.
Al Gore is a red herring: focus on the science and the scientists and ignore the politicians.
I hope we can tackle global warming technologically, that there is such a thing as a non or low carbon industrial society. but if the only industrial society is a high carbon one, then industrial society has to go, and in such a way that mass suffering does not result (the market of course cannot do this in the time required). this is why passions are high in the debates: so much is at stake not least in so many long-reigning paradigms in, especially, Anglo-Atlantic modernity (that historic friend of Catholic culture and sensibilities). the risk is that every “hero of progress” in the “whig interpretation of history” (still believed in fervently in the US despite it falling from grace in the UK and elsewhere thanks to either socialism or nihilism in different quarters) comes out as an enemy of the planet. does all humanity have to become radically ascetic to survive? unlike the Lynn White school I don’t think that Christianity is necessarily implicated in the trajectory that is now potentially coming to crisis: a more cosmic, a more liturgical, a more religious (sensu strictu) Christianity offers us the resources that no flight to the east, whether profound or superficial can provide, since that will always eventuate into a nihilism of sorts.
Oh and the Northwest Passage opened this weekend.
“we must remember that the current US regime has taken this to an unprecendented level. From the outset, they claimed that, as an empire, they make up the facts.”
Er, what?
Sir. Edmund Blackadder:
See Ron Suskind’s essay from 2004: http://www.cs.umass.edu/~immerman/play/opinion05/WithoutADoubt.html
“In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn’t like about Bush’s former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House’s displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn’t fully comprehend — but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency. The aide said that guys like me were ”in what we call the reality-based community,” which he defined as people who ”believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.” I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ”That’s not the way the world really works anymore,” he continued. ”We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
Postmodernism in action!
Anonymous,
As shown above, no one is denying climate change. Your saying it over and over again does not make it so. Sorry, perhaps this will serve as a “Northwest passage” to your reason.
Listen, I’m a critical realist and not a radical postmodernist, but there is this thing called rhetoric. All language is inherently rhetorical. You’re free, of course, to use “deny” and all related terms. But I’ll keep pointing out the nefarious function of the phrase /global warming denier/ in particular. In our cultural framework, it’s a direct echo of /holocaust denier/, intended or not. And I think the use of the phrase is a real cheap shot. Especially to those of us who may be part Jewish.
MM,
It’s not a question of ‘denialism’ being a valid word, it’s a question of it being inappropriate. Derr is not ‘denying’ global warming. He’s not even ‘denying’ an anthropogenic element. Be honest, your use of the term appears to be meant mostly as an incendiary device and is not really reflective of the article you cite. It just further parrots the invective that has made reasoned debate on this issue so difficult.
As to feeling ‘not at liberty’ to dissent from the view of a scientist, doctor or in this case a consensus, I’d say not everyone feels their liberty so constrained, which is fortunate and has proven much to the benefit of mankind over the years.
Finally I think it uncharitable to insist that those disagreeing with your view must necessarily be forming positions solely “to fit (their) ideological predispositions” and I doubt Irenaues or for that matter Derr have done so. Don’t mirror-image.
RM
Iranaeus:
I’m happy to debate this issues, but this semantic exercise is getting silly. Something that has often irked me about contemporary discourse is the tendency to make the nazi genocide a unique event in history, quite apart from everything that came before and will come again. Sadly, that is not the case. Evil events of this nature took place before and after the holocaust. There are some (and I am by no means accusing you of this) who invoke this position to defend the territorial ambitions of modern Israel. You hear it in America in particular: critcize what Israel is doing and sooner or later you will be called anti-semitic (your interloculators will be unaware that Arabs are also semites….). But you did mention “part Jewish”. Why did you not say “part Armenian”? There is a campaign today to deny the Turkisk gencide against the Armenian people. Leading this campaign is the government of Turkey, but they haev the backing of some prominant Jewish lobby members in the US– because they want to appropriate the label for themselves. And yes, that is “denialism” too.
Robert,
My main concern with Derr’s article was the economic impact, which he does indeed deny. There are ways to look at his point (i) global warming is not important, and therefore the medicine is worse than the cure; (ii) global warming may be real, but it won’t be felt for 200-300 years, so let them worry about it. One is tantamount to denying global warming, and two is ethically even worse.
In that case then you should title your post about the economics of global warming and not the denial of global warming. Again, truth is the Catholic position
As a few of us “doubters” have said, we are not denying global warming. We don’t, however, see a consensus in the scientific community about the cause of global warming. I’ve yet to see empirical evidence that humans are the [sole and main] cause of global warming.
Frankly, the moment the media latched onto this “debate” about global warming, it ceased being a scientific issue. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry think they know everything there is to know about how Earth’s ecosystem functions. I personally am not a climatologist, so why would I listen to half of the scientific community that is having a seizure about human-caused global warming when the other half is saying, “Hold on a second?”
“Denying” global warming has nothing to do with the right-wing contingent in America, and everything to do with not hopping on the band wagon. And anytime our deranged American media latches onto some issue, we would be wise to take their story with a grain of salt.
I don’t have any problem with environmental stewardship, in fact I think that is required of us by our faith, but the moment that the Green crowd starts pointing fingers without empirical evidence and scientific consensus, this entire investigation breaks down.
I tend to hang back from the global warming issue, because if the science on the side of those who deny that there could be any human element to global warming is bad, the science of those like Gore who insist that the Earth will reach some sort of irrecoverable tipping point within the next few decades is even worse. It’s really a pretty infuriating topic in that way.
But in reference to MM’s last post, let me speak in that this gets to the root of the whole problem with the way this debate is often framed.
The responsible estimates of the impact of the current warming trend (to whatever extent it is fuelled by human intervention) generally suggest a few inches of sea level by the end of this century, and perhaps a couple feet in 200-300 years.
Now, you’re right that we shouldn’t discount the moral worth of people simply because they live in the future, but at the same time, people seem far too prone to fall into the straight line fallacy in this kind of situation. Should we be concerned about cleaning up our act? Yes. But should we be sitting around wondering if we should abolish industrial society in order to avoid a problem 100+ years off? At the rate we’ve been going, we’ll probably have any number of solutions we could use by then. (I’m personally fascinated by some of the research I’ve heard about looking at producing farms of hyper-CO2-consuming microorganisms or plankton.)
Or look at it this way: What would people have thought of as the biggest industrial pollution concerns in 1807? How many of them still hold true today?
If you look at the “peak oil” or “peak energy” literature, it looks like we’ll run out of fossil fuels long before catastrophic global warming could occur. I’m by no means a scientist, of course; I’m thinking of the analysis done by the Chair of the Division of Engineering and Applied Science at CalTech, showing that the Chicken Little models of global warming generally assume that we have several times more carbon to burn than actually exists. Indeed, almost half of the IPCC scenarios assume that global oil production will be higher in 2100 than in 2000.
He takes a well-known climate model, and plugs in more accurate assumptions about future fossil fuel use. The conclusion:
Now maybe this guy is all wrong, but he certainly seems to be a credible source. Also, just in case someone wishes to “deny” his analysis because they don’t like the political implications, I’ll freely admit that his analysis doesn’t imply that we should do nothing about carbon emissions — maybe that 0.8 degrees is going to be harmful enough on its own, or maybe it would be best to put off the disappearance of fossil fuels for as long as possible. Still, if the drastic scenarios of global warming depend on increasing oil production indefinitely into the future — which clearly isn’t going to happen — then maybe we should be a little bit more sober-minded here.