Posted on 01/28/2005 7:29:42 AM PST by presidio9
WASHINGTON - A provocative new novel that says fears of global warming are unjustified and stoked by an environmentalist-media conspiracy is taking Washington by storm.
“State of Fear,” a novel by Michael Crichton, the best-selling author of “Jurassic Park,” and the creator of the TV show “ER”, compares scientists who warn of global warming to advocates of eugenics who said that the mixing of races would ruin the world’s genetic stock.
In an appendix explaining his position, Crichton writes: “Nobody knows how much of the present warming trend might be a natural phenomenon. Nobody knows how much of the present warming trend might be man-made. Nobody knows how much warming will occur in the next century."
Sixteen of 18 top U.S. climate scientists interviewed by Knight Ridder, however, said the Harvard-trained author is bending scientific data and distorting research.
“Wrong, wrong, wrong," said Martin Hoffert, a professor of physics at New York University. “The best face I can put on this is that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. The worst is that he’s intentionally deceiving people as he accuses environmentalists (of doing) in ‘State of Fear.’ "
The overwhelming majority of climate scientists say the world is warming, mainly because of emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The biggest increase in those gases comes from the burning of fossil fuels. U.S. and foreign authorities predict a 5-degree Fahrenheit increase in the world’s average temperature by the end of the century. Ice sheets are melting, and species of birds and animals have moved to new areas because of warming.
Nevertheless, Crichton’s novel has grabbed the fancy of Washington political conservatives. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman James Inhofe, R-Okla., in a Senate speech this month, called the book “the real story" of climate change. Conservative think tanks and columnists promote the novel.
On Friday, Crichton hits Washington, speaking to the neo-conservative American Enterprise Institute and the National Press Club. His publicist, Jennifer Swihart, says he’s also having a private “high-profile meeting” with someone she isn’t allowed to name.
Jerry Mahlman, a senior climate scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., attributes Washington’s embrace of Crichton to fear: “The fundamental reality of the elementary physics of global warming is spooking the heck out of people and they’re looking for ways to get out of it.”
Crichton’s supporters credit his research skill, writing ability and celebrity. Crichton’s book is “influential for the simple reason that he did it," said Frank Maisano, an energy lobbyist who fights global warming measures. “He is a rock star in terms of telling stories.”
Two climate scientists said they loved Crichton’s book.
“It was a fun read and the science was handled intelligently and responsibly," said MIT meteorology professor Richard Lindzen. “Crichton has studied the science for the last three years and comes to the issue with intelligence as well as a professional scientific background.”
For his part, Crichton writes, “Everybody has an agenda. Except me."
"State of Fear" follows a mainstream environmental group’s foray into terrorism. The environmentalists try to trigger a tsunami, flash floods and calving icebergs to convince the world of the dangers of climate change and raise more money.
Amid that plot, Crichton drops in graphs and footnotes to buttress his contention that global warming isn’t a real problem.
Three scientists - Hoffert, physicist Ben Santer of the Lawrence Livermore National Lab in California, and NASA’s James Hansen - told Knight Ridder that Crichton distorted their research in the novel.
Crichton declined to be interviewed or to answer 10 questions that were e-mailed to him through his publicist.
Hansen, the director of the Goddard Institute of Space Sciences, takes issue with Crichton’s contention that Hansen’s 1988 prediction for warming was off by 300 percent. Hansen said his paper presented three predictions of future warming and said the middle case was the most likely. Crichton took the highest prediction and ignored the middle-case scenario, which was off by 20 percent, according to Hansen.
“How would you describe what Mr. Crichton did? Science fiction? Scientific fraud?” Hansen wrote.
To challenge the warming predictions, Crichton also cites dropping temperatures in places such as Punta Arenas, Chile; Greenville, S.C.; Truman, Mo.; and Ann Arbor, Mich.
While some places have cooled, responded Henry Pollack, a professor of geophysics at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, far more places have gotten hotter. That’s especially true, he added, for the 79 percent of the world that's covered by oceans.
The world’s overall temperature is rising, according to the federal government’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. Last year was the fourth hottest ever recorded. The five hottest years on record have all occurred since 1998. The 10 hottest years on record have all occurred since 1990. The last month to record below-average temperature was July 1985.
ping
I highly recommend this book. It's much better than Prey was ;)
Prey sucked.
Chrichton is right.
In all of creation, only arrogant man would actually believe that he is able to thwart God or irretrievably alter his creation and go beyond the boundries he has set.
Just for starters:
Who were the 18? How were they selected for interview? In what way is this professor of physics you quoted a climate scientist?
And what did the idiot scientists say about that loony movie that was all the lefty rage before the election?
It's a novel so it can have any plot line the author wants it to.
Scientists don't operate on the basis of how many agree and how many disagree on something. This gives away the liberal slant because that's the way liberal journalists think: the truth is identified by how big a majority believe it. "Science by consensus is a liberal fantasy.
Good for Chrichton!
Crichton is right on the science but State of Fear is a terrible novel. The characters are completely undeveloped and the situations in the novel are ridiculous. It read like a hastily written first draft. The man needs a new editor.
Crichton drops in graphs and footnotes to buttress his contention that global warming isn't a real problem.
Wrong. Crichton drops in graphs and footnotes to buttress his conclusion that the evidence for global warming is a very, very great deal less sound than environmentalists think it is -- both as to whether it's occurring at all and as to whether human beings are contributing to it if it is occurring. He doesn't claim it isn't a real problem; he says that's an open question and it's way too early to get excited about it.
It would sure be nice if journalists covering this debate would get straight what the various parties do and don't claim.
Yes, it is better
than Prey, but this book sucks, too.
Nothing but lawyers
talking to lawyers,
then Martin Sheen gets eaten.
One good scene. That's it.
Last year was the fourth hottest ever recorded. The five hottest years on record have all occurred since 1998. The 10 hottest years on record have all occurred since 1990. The last month to record below-average temperature was July 1985.
SO? How does that implicate man-made causes?
Agreed, but then again the Martin Sheen character gets sliced up and eaten alive by "peaceful" tribesmen in touch with nature, and that scene alone was worth the price of the book.
Well, the book had it's moments but it was still terrible overall.
The eugenics parallel was pretty well put, I agree. However, dreck it was.
...The overwhelming majority of climate scientists say the world is warming, mainly because of emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The biggest increase in those gases comes from the burning of fossil fuels. U.S. and foreign authorities predict a 5-degree Fahrenheit increase in the world’s average temperature by the end of the century. Ice sheets are melting, and species of birds and animals have moved to new areas because of warming.
Climate scientists? Do you guys just want more money? I had a conversation with an astronomy professor who said there was not a single astrophysicist he knew believed that the empirical data supported man causes global warming, which will lead to catastrophe. There is not enough information to make a conclusion.
I'm not a huge Crichton fan, but the difference between this book and "The Day After Tomorrow" is that Crichton actually researched the topic, and included footnotes for all the sceintific points he made.
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