No, Climate Change Deniers Aren’t Modern Day Galileos

[cbayer]

http://religiondispatches.org/no-climate-change-deniers-arent-modern-day-galileos/

BY ANDREW AGHAPOUR AND MICHAEL SCHULSON APRIL 30, 2015

Let’s say you’re a prominent climate change denier. And then Pope Francis comes along and announces that climate change is going to be a major item on his agenda for the coming months. What do you do?

Do you:

(A) Hold a press conference in Rome and tell the Church it has no business meddling in science;

(B) Accuse Pope Francis of being misled by charlatan UN experts; or

(C) Liken climate-deniers to Galileo, as part of a long line of truth-tellers who have been marginalized by the moralizing authority of the Catholic Church.

The answer is (D) All of the above.

more at link

[Buzz Clik]

1. The science has moved on.

Climate change denial has become irrelevant.

[cbayer]

2. I hope you are right, but I'd feel better if everyone was onboard this train.

[Buzz Clik]

4. These things take time, and even then true consensus is difficult

Mendeleev's periodic table in 1871 was controversial at the time, and it took decades of debate and tuning to bring it into focus.

Climate change is a lot more difficult to pin down.

[cbayer]

7. I don't disagree, but I think this may be more critical than the periodic table.

There is an urgency here and anyone who drags their feet is a threat.

[Leontius]

5. The science may have moved on

but many of the people who will deal with have not and they hold the reins of power.

[Buzz Clik]

6. Correct. The solution will be highly political

[trotsky]

3. Well see, here's your problem, CB.

You have previously declared that unless one can PROVE someone else is wrong, one cannot even claim they are.

With climate change, while we have plentiful evidence it is occurring, we cannot PROVE it is entirely or even mostly human-caused, which is where the deniers have staked out their position. Oh we also have lots of evidence it's human-caused - plenty to convince most rational people - but not enough to PROVE it, at least not to the standards that you have decreed.

Kinda sucks when the deniers are enabled by that.