[WikiEN-l] Enviornmentalism vs. Science (was: William Connolley a rational contributor)

[Poor, Edmund W]

> Ed > It's basically Singer's POV vs. Connolley's POV. Lots of 
> Ed > environmentalsts side with Connolley, and lots of others side
with 
> Ed > Singer.

Cunctator replied to Ed:
> Actually, it's "people who believe in science" vs. Singer.

Mere POV.

This is one of the most common arguments of enviromentalists. They claim
their position on GW is "the scientific position", hence anyone who
disagrees with their position is "unscientific".

They bolster this position with their incessantly repeated claim that
there is a "scientific consensus" in favor of GW theory. 

There are 2 logical errors with this POV, either of which is sufficient
to demolish it. Anyway, it's their POV and should be labelled as such in
Wikipedia articles, which is all I've ever asked for.

1. There is no scientific consensus. They just made it up. The IPCC's
contributors, when polled, were split 50-50 on whether human-caused
emissions were contributing to GW.

2. Even if an overwhelming majority of people believe something, this
doesn't make it true. All the experts were against Copernicus, until one
solitary observer (Galileo) pointed his telescope at the Jupiter and
discovered 4 moons revolving around it.

The POV that the debate is "science" vs. the skeptics might be held by
the editors of ''Scientific American'' magazine, but that is a popular
magazine for laymen, with a long history of taking political stances on
scientific issues. SciAm is hardly representative of the world's
scientists.

Uncle Ed