Earlier this week the long-running popular comic strip Dilbert took a sweet poke at the cult of Global Warming — you know, those who freak out and scream “heretic” at anyone who dares question The Dogma of the Settled Science. As is the case with most Dilbert strips, this one takes place at the office and ends with a quietly hilarious punch-line.
To make his employees aware of the dangers of Climate Change, Dilbert’s boss invites a scientist to explain how “human activity is warming the earth and will lead to a global catastrophe.” Dilbert asks calmly, “How do scientists know that?” The scientist responds with all kinds of authority about the use of physics and chemistry to measure temperature and carbon over time, about how that data is input into models that “have never been right” (which is true).
Dilbert asks, “What if I don’t trust the economic models?”
The scientist then turns to Dilbert’s boss and asks, “Who hired the science denier?”
Even though science gets things wrong all the time (remember when coffee, eggs, butter, and salt were bad for you?), even though the planet is billions of years old and goes through warming and cooling cycles (ice age, anyone?), even though those who pretend to believe most in Global Warming do not act like it by continuing to live and invest on the same coasts they claim will soon flood (Hi CNN!), even though science is incapable of predicting tomorrow’s weather with any impressive degree of accuracy … this Global Warming thing they got nailed!
Scott Adams, the high-profile Trump supporter who created Dilbert, uses his art here to make a crucially important point. Not only how faulty the science around Climate Change is, but that those who have any degree of confidence in their beliefs, those who have real answers to legitimate questions, do not immediately resort to name-calling.
The Gaia Cult Of The Warming Planet does not freak out over those of us who know it is all a hoax because they are worried about the fate of the planet. If that were the case, if they were truly worried about the effect of carbon on our survival, they would move from the coasts to Middle America, they would act like people who know a catastrophe is imminent through their own behavior. They don’t because they know better than anyone that it is all a hoax — one created to further the left-wing cause of an authoritarian central government.
The real reason they freak out is because they do not have all the answers, they cannot suitably explain the fact that almost every scientific model has been proven wrong, they cannot wish away the naked corruption exposed by the “hide the decline” emails.
Like anyone, when you are caught in a lie, you have two choices: confess to the lie or freak out using phony indignation, smears, boycotts and name-calling — all of it meant to chill inquiry, silence the doubters, end the questions, kill debate, and cast heretics out of polite society as a means to protect the cult. And what could be more anti-science than that? Skepticism used to be the oil in the engine of science. But Global Warming isn’t a science, it is a left-wing talking point.
In his own brilliant way, and by using the enormous power of popular culture, Adams captured all of that perfectly.
More please.
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