Can Science Save Us?

...which reminds me - I recommend anyone in the Sheffield vicinity visits the 'Can Art Save Us?' exhibition at the Millenium Galleries. I may do another blog about it when I'm in the mood.

In my last blog entry I aired some thinking about the ways people believe or disbelieve climate science.

Coincidentally my wife and Green Empire co-director has just started reading Ben Goldacre's book, Bad Science. Visit his website http://www.badscience.net/ The book is basically about health science (or lack thereof) in the media and in marketing of health foods, supplements, cosmetics etc. We've all laughed at TV ads for shampoo with added pro-hypo-filamentorium-12. (Well, I hope we have).

Goldacre's premise is this: people who stand to make vast amounts of money have a habit of concocting misrepresented, bogus or simply invented scientific cases for the health benefits of their products, as well as being, erm, wide of the mark about their own qualifications. (Favourite quote: "Dr Gillian McKeith PhD or, to give her her full medical title, Gillian McKeith....") These products usually turn out to be ineffectual or might, in some cases, actually be harmful. Goldacre's answer is simply: live well, exercise, eat well, and be highly sceptical of apparently scientific claims unless you genuinely understand them.

Now, don't get me wrong - I am not, repeat not, a climate change sceptic. In fact I am worried to near paralysis when I read detailed papers on climate science, and so often avoid reminding myself of how bad things might actually be, for fear of being driven to drink. (Fortunately the pub is 40 seconds walk away so I don't need a chauffeur in any case).

If, on the other hand, I drew all my climate change evidence from the same newspapers, TV programmes and internettage that promote the kind of cod science about health that Ben Goldacre rightly despairs of, I would probably be wise to be suspicious.

In other words, what people tend not to trust is not so much the facts, as the sources. The impressionable amongst us will believe in climate change one week, and dismiss it the next, depending on what they've most recently read or seen on the telly. The more cautious of us will be generally doubtful until they see closely argued and referenced science - and you really, really hav to go looking for that. Especially since a lot of scientific papers are written in a language so dense that, well, you need to be scientist to spot the difference between the kosher and the kodswallop.

We have nurtured a generation that divides into the gullible and the cynical. That climate science appears to inspire doubt is, in this context, probably a good thing, since it implies that people are taking the issue seriously and will become passionate about tackling climate change once they are given impartial evidence from sources they trust.

In my work with WWF a few months ago I found that the ordinary people we interviewed craved impartial, robust information and despaired that they couldn't find it. All information in the public domain is assumed to be biased by political and/or financial motives.

We should put our faith in the wisdom of these ordinary people and do them the service of providing trustworthy information.

AW.