The Randi Boner

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James Randi spoke up yesterday about global warming, and not many skeptics think good things of his position.

First let me be clear about my position on Anthroprogenic Global Warming (AGW):  I am not a climate scientist.  I DO NOT KNOW.

Now if Randi had taken that simple tack, I wouldn't be writing this.  Instead his position can largely be summed up as "There is a lot of controversy and there are more important things to worry about."

On account of that sentiment people are implying that he is senile and/or a AGW denier.  Maybe he is.  Maybe he isn't.

Now I need to rewind to my AGW position...  As I said, I do not know.  I am not a scientist and the evidence both for and against is extremely complex.  There IS a lot of controversy.  I really have no way of reliably determining for myself whether human-kind is adding to the Global Warming trends - or even if those tends truly exist.  I don't have the knowledge or know how, and neither do the vast majority of people on the planet - Randi included.

So, if we don't know, what do we do?

It's an irresponsible choice to take the "well, if I can't tell, then it doesn't matter" option.

For myself, I've made an effort over an extended period of time (read: years) to make a mental list of the voices that I trust to distill the information and percolate it down to me in various forms.  I've selected this informal list my gradually assessing who consisently speaks with sound logic and whose positions consisntly correlate with either verifiable reality or, at the least, with the past positions (prior plausibility essentially) of other people who I have gradually learned I can rely upon.

This isn't a matter of realying to an appeal to authority, it's a matter of assessing concensus of authorities.

Randi is one of these authorities, and on this matter he is not falling in line with the others.  That is why I have come to rely upon multiple authorities and not one divine proctor of all knowledge.  Randi knows his stuff when it comes to charlatans.  But – forgive the broken record – he is not a climate scientist.

Most of the sources that I trust acknowledge AGW – or at least GW – and thus I have generally speaking come down on the side of being an advocate of efforts to reduce the effect mankind is exerting upon the environment. Yes. I have doubts. Yes, I fight constantly with the seemingly innate desire to consume. But even if I were ultimately a denier I would have to acknowledge that doing nothing is a negligent fools bet.

If I am wrong and humanity has no effect upon the climate, then what has been lost? In the grand scheme of things, very little. Everyone’s quality of life would be reduced by what is ultimately a small amount (recall we used to call caves ‘home’) – with the greatest individual impacts falling upon the most successful capitalists (those who have the most head-room to lose).

If I am right, and we do nothing, the possible most extreme cost is the extinction of humanity and many many many other living species. That is your life, the lives of everyone you know, their pets, most of the living things they feed upon, the wild animals that they watch on Discovery channel specials and the descendants of every single one of those people and things forever and ever and ever. It’s considerably more than a metric fuck-ton.

So... if there is the least chance that we can affect or ameliorate climate change by tempering our actions we must do so. Not “should if it’s convenient” – we must.

It’s not really a matter of whether the logic of the science appears to be right or not – there are too many existing confounding factors that makes the issue too inscruitable to the average joe. “Average Joe” (or Jane) is who almost all of us are. We can only really act wisely upon the best gamble.

Randi is not applying logic to what would be the best gamble. Perhaps that’s got something to do with his advanced age or his lack of descendants, but the reasons aren’t really relevant. The fact remains that he has put his foot in it.

We shouldn’t expect that Randi is going to be imperfect. We shouldn’t expect him to uphold every one of our own individual values. He may be our collective hero and one of our greatest spokesman – but relying upon him alone for direction is nothing but an appeal to authority.

Perhaps in a way this is a good thing for skepticism. There are those in the world who will snidely point at our luminaries and accuse the rank and file of group-think. But here is a chance to show that we do not fall in line behind Randi – or by extension Dawkins or Shermer or Plait or Nickell. We do not follow anyone. We have great respect for those who have demonstrated their ability to filter the bullshit in the world with consistency, but we have no blind fealty to them.