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Science wins
Terence Corcoran Financial Post
Friday, December 19, 2003
It's been a rough year for environmental extremists. As the Kyoto Accord slips into a coma, 2003 could even mark the beginning of the end of the greatest world experiment, the attempt to push science and politics into a big centrifuge to create a system for global governance.
The collapse of Kyoto is a world-scale event. A microcosm of the shifting links between politics and science is the much smaller breaking story of Bjrn Lomborg. Earlier this year, when a Danish government agency declared Mr. Lomborg, author of The Skeptical Environmentalist, a "dishonest" scientist, the Big Green Left rejoiced. For two years, environmental activists had sought to discredit Mr. Lomborg, whose brilliant book valiantly demolished much of the junk science and fabricated alarmism that drives the global environmental movement. Mr. Lomborg was especially effective in dismissing Kyoto as an over-costly attempt to fix a climate issue that he considered "not anywhere near the most important problem facing the world."
The attacks on Mr. Lomborg were vicious, personal and extreme, and appeared in some of the most respected science publications: Nature, Science and Scientific American. The final blow came when a bureaucratic sub-agency within the Danish Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation -- bearing the Orwellian name Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty -- issued a report last January. It said Mr. Lomborg had committed acts of "scientific dishonesty" in The Skeptical Environmentalist.
The enthusiasm for this conclusion was widespread. A former editor of Nature said Mr. Lomborg had "veered well across the line that divides controversial -- if competent -- science from unrepentant incompetence." The president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science said "this is a just outcome that ought to bring his credibility to a halt."
Well, it hasn't. What came to a halt this week, in fact, is the Danish committees finding against Mr. Lomborg In a new report, the Danish Ministry of Science repudiated the findings. All the dishonesty, apparently, is inside the committees. Among other things, the government said that in attacking Mr. Lomborg the committee "had not documented where [Mr. Lomborg] has allegedly been biased in his choice of date and in his argumentation." It said that the committees actual conclusion was that "there was no scientific dishonesty" found, but the conclusion was distorted. It accused the committees of using emotive language. (See below. Readers interested in the details can go to www.imv.dk/Default.asp?ID=233.)
The real issue here is the politicization of the process to discredit Mr. Lomborg, who is also head of the Danish Institute for Environmental Assessment. Rather than answer Mr. Lomborg's findings and conclusions through argument, debate and fact, his scientific and political opponents went for the political jugular. They smeared and criticized his work, aiming to discredit him rather than engage him.
Perhaps they knew too well that the deliberate alarmism that is the official strategy in the political arena cannot, in the end, stand up to the scientific reality that Mr. Lomborg defended so brilliantly in his book.
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WHY THE LOMBORG DECISION WAS OVERTURNED:
Excerpts from the Institute for Miljvurdering Web site.
The Danish Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation has today repudiated findings by the Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty (DCSD) that Bjrn Lomborg's book The Skeptical Environmentalist was "objectively dishonest" or "clearly contrary to the standards of good scientific practice".
The Ministry, which is responsible for the DCSD, has today released a critical assessment of the committees' Jan. 6 ruling. The Ministry finds that the DCSD judgment was not backed up by documentation, and was "completely void of argumentation" for the claims of dishonesty and lack of good scientific practice.
The Ministry characterizes the DCSD's treatment of the case as "dissatisfactory", "deserving criticism" and "emotional" and points out a number of significant errors. The DCSD's verdict has consequently been remitted.
Bjrn Lomborg, director of the Denmark's Environmental Assessment Institute (EAI), today expressed his satisfaction with the ruling. "It has been almost two years since the beginning of the DCSD case against my book," Mr. Lomborg said.
"It has been hard, but I am happy that we now have confirmation that freedom of speech extends to environmental debate. Now that this distraction is behind us, we can concentrate our efforts on matters of importance - namely, how to prioritize our efforts for the environment.
"The DCSD judgment lacked substance and, even in January, 2003, it was clear that it could not withstand scrutiny. The case was infected from the beginning. This was pointed out by commentators from leading Danish and international media. Almost 300 scientists signed a protest against the ruling.
"The DCSD ruling came at a convenient time for many people who wanted to criticize my work, and that of the EAI. The complaints about my book were not based on science, but on a desire to stop me being appointed Director of the EAI. The DCSD case has had a great impact on the working environment at the EAI.
"With today's scathing assessment of the DCSD ruling, it has now been established that if someone wants to criticize the Institute or my book - and anyone is welcome to do so - mudslinging is not enough. You have to use solid arguments," Mr. Lomborg said.
© National Post 2003
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