The Lost Art of Connecting Dots: Part Four

science (noun): the observation, identification, description, experimental investigation, and theoretical explanation of natural phenomena.

In the phrases, experimental investigation and theoretical explanation, that definition recalls the words of Albert Einstein:

EDITOR’S NOTE: SEE PRIOR PARTS IN THIS SERIES BELOW⤵︎

The Lost Art of Connecting Dots: Part Three

Those phrases also recall Thomas Kuhn’s notions about science from his 1961 book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. In that book, Kuhn wrote this:

In case it escaped your notice, the words settled and denier are conspicuously absent from Kuhn’s writing. And at no point does Kuhn suggest the members of Group B are, in any form or fashion, wrong because their inclinations and their work are different from those of Group A. The inclinations and the work of the members of Group B might be different from those of Group A. The members of Group B might be more curious than the members of Group A. But Group B is not wrong for disagreeing with Group A.

Settled and denier are used most frequently in these enlightened and narrative- and ideology-driven times, of course, in reference to climate change. But science, by nature and definition, can’t be settled, ever. And aside from its being a naturally occurring phenomenon of a dynamically evolving planet, neither can climate change. That’s how and why we have this post — “Ice Follies” (that contains actual empirical data and unsettled science) — from the site, Watts Up With That?

My fervent hope is that you’ll read the whole post and that you’ll study the historical data charted and graphed therein. But if you don’t (or you won’t), please at least read this:

If you’re anything like me, reading things like that makes you contemplate cause (agendas) and effect (climate hysteria). Once you do that, you’re bound to encounter those troublesome dots again. And here they are, in an article entitled, “Climate activists invest in property on beaches they say are disappearing”, that starts out like this:

Well, steal my wallet and call me Oliver Twist. Why in the climate-changing, rising-tides world would they (and the rest of their political cronies) do such a thing? Could it be they know anthropogenic climate change is just a power-preserving exercise in political and economic chicanery? Could it be the reason they promote climate-change hysteria is to keep us away from the oceanfront real estate they’d just as soon have for themselves? Could it be they do it because, given their financial independence, they get a boot out of soaking the rest of us? (No pun intended.) Or could it be they’re just blatant, shameless hypocrites?

I don’t know. But I do know if we accept their motivations without asking questions, we do so at our own peril and to our own detriment.

It’s not the going astray that bothers me. It’s the reasons for which they go astray. We are, after all, living in The Age of the Narrative. We’re being fed immeasurable volumes of information. That information is coming from sources driven by commercial, political, faux-scientific, and increasingly special interests. We’re being challenged to find the truth in any of it. And if we give the people of fortune an inch, they’ll take a mile, along with all the power, control, and money they can grab.

Why is that? Not surprisingly, the answer is ideology. Given the facts that (A) we are, indeed, living in in The Age of the Narrative and (B) we are, indeed, being fed immeasurable volumes of information from sources driven by commercial, political, faux-scientific, and increasingly special interests, we come increasingly to believe our choices are limited to this or that. One or the other. In the zero-sum assault on and lobbying for our attention spans, everything is either black or white. Right or wrong. For or against.

No shades. No nuance. No middle. No other possibilities. And if one side is wrong, nothing about the other side can be right. In this force-fed reality, those on any side simply can’t allow for the possibility of another side. That, boys and girls, is as blatant an appeal to ideological predispositions as we’re ever likely to see.

While we’re on the subjects of narratives, ideology, and connecting dots, there’s always this humanity-blaming rallying cry: “But 97 percent of climate scientists agree about anthropogenic [pick one: global warming or climate change]!” Do they? By what sources of information would have us believe that’s true? Where does the funding for those sources of information come from? Why would they have us believe it’s true? Do you wonder? Have you explored it for yourself? In the words of Ross McKitrick: “What we really need to call out is the use of false propaganda and demagogy to derail factual debate and careful consideration of all facets of the most complex scientific and policy issue of our time.”

Thomas Kuhn could explain how that could be true — how false propaganda and demagogy have buttressed our ideological stances on climate (and everything else, for that matter), how propagandists and demagogues could selectively choose the findings of Group A over Group B and pass them off as truth in the popular political narrative. He did just that in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions:

Please pay special attention to Kuhn’s language here: The triumph of beliefs and preconceptions emphasized on some special part of the too sizable and inchoate pool of information. What is that special part? What makes it special? To whom? Why did some particular beliefs and preconceptions(!) triumph? Who ensured their triumph? Why? Why are we not allowed to ask? Why are we demonized if we do?

Aren’t we supposed to be more protective of — more defensive about — falsehoods than we are the truth? Who’s so afraid of the truth? Why? Why is a questioner necessarily a denier? If Group A and Group B are practicing literal, exploratory science, how can anything either of those groups finds or examines be considered settled?

The only way to resolve conflict is to embrace it. Likewise, the only way to learn anything is to let the scales fall from our eyes, to pry our noggins open, and to question everything.

Everything.