Give Me a Fact, Any Fact

In his most recent column, New York Times op-ed writer John Tierney reviews Joel Garreau’s new book, Radical Evolution.  In the book, Garreau argues that the intersection of new genetic understanding with advances in information technology, robotics and nano-technology is, for good or ill, about to speed up human evolution unimaginably.  For some reason, Tierney, who says he has “for decades” been “debunking prophesies of doom as either imaginary or wildly exaggerated,” finds the bizarre notion that scientists might accidentally create “nanobots” that will dissolve all matter on the earth more compelling that the threat of global warming or energy depletion.  (In a recent column he dismissed the idea of peak oil despite admitting that he knows nothing about it).

Keep in mind that Tierney is not a climatologist, biologist, physicist, geologist or computer programmer.  Like most pundits today, the strength of his arguments about what we should and shouldn’t worry about rest only on the strength of his opinion, and the strength of his opinion rests squarely on the fact that it is his own. 

Tierney says the downside of the “post-human” hypothesis gives him pause because its promoters “aren’t just the usual technophobes.”  Why he thinks that the retired CEO of Sun Microsystems paints a more believable doomsday scenario than vast majority of climatologists who believe that global warming is real, or the petroleum geologists, energy bankers and physicists who warn of energy depletion, is not entirely clear.  Maybe issues of energy are too last century for him, or maybe he finds environmentalists annoying.  Maybe the idea that we will be destroyed by our runaway genius rather than by our hubris and stupidity is comforting; it aggrandizes human achievement even as it pretends to fear it.

What is clear is that there are no facts in Tierney’s columns, and precious little argument, for that matter—just assertions.  But these days, facts don’t matter, especially among libertarian or right-leaning opinion makers; their positions are positions of faith, the content of which is made up on the fly.  It hardly matters whether that content is fundamentalist Christianity, “free market” greedism or some blasphemous Frankenstein hybrid of the two.  We make our own reality now, and truth doesn’t stand in the way. 

The day after Tierney’s piece was published, there was a story in the Times about new satellite observations showing that Arctic ice is melting faster and the water is warmer; scientists fear that we may have set off a warming feedback loop.  Too bad Tierney’s “debunked” stories keep coming back. 

On the same day, the Arts section of the paper reported that author Michael Crichton, whose most recent novel is about evil environmentalists using terrorism to convince the world of the truth of climate change, will testify before Congress on the subject of global warming. 

Crichton is not a climatologist, but we should probably listen to him; he’s very famous and has strong opinions on the matter. 

Comments

[Karen]

Well done Lakis! Care to take on a few of the pundits from Fox news? Opinions without facts are bad enough. How about opinions with distortions and outright lies.

Is it possible that the news media will ever return to reporting facts and well thought out analyses of important issues?

Do folks care enough to demand it - or is it just more entertaining to listen to Rush and Bill spout venom?

Keep the articles coming. Meanwhile, I am pondering your other articles and looking to do a lot more reading on these issues.

[Lakis]

Thanks for the comment Karen.

I wouldn't even know where to begin with Fox "news". They can't even settle on a line of reasoning when something like Katrina happens -- they say "let's not play the blame game" and then devote all their energies blaming the governor and local authorities.

However, I'm almost more concerned about the lack of mainstream media (as opposed to Republican mouthpiece Fox) interest or understanding on the energy depletion issue. Even liberals don't seem to have a real understanding of how serious our crisis might be.

Thanks for checking out the site and for your comments. I look forward to hearing your future thoughts.

[Robert Daniels]

I have the answer to the "City of the Future". I will share if you are interested. It uses 5%-10% current amount of energy as cities in developed countries (1,500 KwH/person/yr). No cars or trucks, instead electric mono-rail between mega-structures of 15,000 - 25,000 people living in sustainable ecological foot prints of about 6-8 square miles of adjacent gardens and parks. The structure can withstand the violent Earth catastrophe, terrorism and pandemic inundation. The cities are called "ARCS"!