[Vision2020] Noam Chomsky: How Climate Change Became a 'Liberal Hoax'

[Ted Moffett]

The irony is that the US government has censored climate science, and
not via alleged "liberal" operators, but by the Bush administration,
which I do not think many would call "liberal."

An excellent book on this subject is by Mark Bowen (PhD. Physics,
MIT), "Censoring Science: The Political Attack on Dr. James Hansen and
the Truth of Global Warming," ( http://www.mark-bowen.com/book_cs.html
). This book exhaustively presents research into the political
machinery during the Bush administration that censored and threatened
the professional career of NASA climate scientist James Hansen.  Like
the Soviet Union (liberal hoax?) indeed, as the quote from James
Hansen indicates at this source below:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/10/AR2006021001766.html

NEW YORK, Feb. 10, 2006 -- James E. Hansen, the NASA climate scientist
who sparked an uproar last month by accusing the Bush administration
of keeping scientific information from reaching the public, said
Friday that officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration are also muzzling researchers who study global warming.

"It seems more like Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union than the United
States," said Hansen, prompting a round of applause from the audience.
--------------------
As if there are "conservative" and "liberal" versions of the laws of
physics!  The science regarding anthropogenic climate warming is
fundamentally about laws of physics.

The education level of the public regarding the scientific method and
what science reveals about the objectivity of the functioning of the
natural world, is on some isses alarmingly low, especially for a
civilization where every day nearly everyone utilizes technology that
is fundamentally based on discoveries from the scientific method,
trusted to be reliable because of the objectivity of the functioning
of the natural world.

It seems people except and trust what the objective pursuit of science
has revealed when it suits their purposes, but if the discoveries of
science reveal that something about our way of life is fundamentally
flawed, then science is not to be trusted.

How many people think there are political versions of the science
regarding how nuclear weapons operate, or the forces and speed
required to launch a satellite into orbit, or how radio and other
transmissions are sent and received, or the basics of how electricity
is generated and sent to their homes and businesses?

Yet when science reveals that human behavior is having a potentially
very dangerous impact on our planet, due to fossil fuel emissions into
our atmosphere, science and scientists are thrown under the bus.
Climate science is a poltical hoax to impose socialism and/or big
government regulation.

I suppose denial of the problem makes sense, though, because who wants
to hear that one of the foundations of the wealth and progress of our
civilization (fossil fuel energy) is profoundly altering our planet,
in a potentially disastrous manner, likely for centuries or millenia
(Geological Society of London, Nov. 2010:
http://www.geolsoc.org.uk/climatechange "...recovery of the Earth’s
climate in the absence of any mitigation measures could take 100,000
years or more.")?

The first stage of a cancer diagnosis is denial, and this psychology
might apply to how many people view anthropogenic climate warming:
http://www.livestrong.com/article/267917-stages-of-acceptance-in-cancer/
"Kubler-Ross lists five stages through which patients progress when
they know their disease is terminal. The first stage is denial,..."
------------------------------------------
Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett

On 2/10/11, Dave <tiedye at turbonet.com> wrote:
> http://www.commondreams.org/video/2011/02/10
>
> Dave
>
> --
> Windows, OSX, or Linux is the same choice as:
> McDonald's, Burger King, or a (real) Co-Op.
>
>