Posted on 01/31/2007 2:50:01 PM PST by ventanax5
I have been asked to talk about what I consider the most important challenge facing mankind, and I have a fundamental answer. The greatest challenge facing mankind is the challenge of distinguishing reality from fantasy, truth from propaganda. Perceiving the truth has always been a challenge to mankind, but in the information age (or as I think of it, the disinformation age) it takes on a special urgency and importance.
We must daily decide whether the threats we face are real, whether the solutions we are offered will do any good, whether the problems we're told exist are in fact real problems, or non-problems. Every one of us has a sense of the world, and we all know that this sense is in part given to us by what other people and society tell us; in part generated by our emotional state, which we project outward; and in part by our genuine perceptions of reality. In short, our struggle to determine what is true is the struggle to decide which of our perceptions are genuine, and which are false because they are handed down, or sold to us, or generated by our own hopes and fears.
As an example of this challenge, I want to talk today about environmentalism. And in order not to be misunderstood, I want it perfectly clear that I believe it is incumbent on us to conduct our lives in a way that takes into account all the consequences of our actions, including the consequences to other people, and the consequences to the environment.
(Excerpt) Read more at crichton-official.com ...
What a breath of fresh air (pun intended).
Excellent article...
A most excellent article, thanks for posting. I have been having the same argument with some that I know, who are complete atheists but accept "climate change" blindly and will look at no dissent. Sadly, I am unable to even get my foot in the door with them in a rational conversation.
Outstanding article.
GLOBAL WARMING: A CHILLING PERSPECTIVE (Great resource for rebutting global warming dogma!!!)
Yep, you said this a long time ago.
Worth repeating.
Not only has environmentalism become a religion it also has a willing Inquisition in the MSM.
What a truly excellent article. His clarity and precise focus on the subject are unmistakable.
Watched "Andromeda Strain" for the first time in years last night. Crichton is truly one of the greatest American thinkers of the 20th Century (and beyond).
Thanks for the ping. This is an excellent article. The underlying problem is that too many people do not want to distinguish reality from fantasy or truth from propaganda. They believe what they believe because they want to believe it. Period.
AWESOME article. Great timing too.
"I can tell you that DDT is not a carcinogen and did not cause birds to die and should never have been banned. I can tell you that the people who banned it knew that it wasn't carcinogenic and banned it anyway. I can tell you that the DDT ban has caused the deaths of tens of millions of poor people, mostly children, whose deaths are directly attributable to a callous, technologically advanced western society that promoted the new cause of environmentalism by pushing a fantasy about a pesticide, and thus irrevocably harmed the third world. Banning DDT is one of the most disgraceful episodes in the twentieth century history of America. We knew better, and we did it anyway, and we let people around the world die and didn't give a damn."
Envirostalinists
"I can tell you that second hand smoke is not a health hazard to anyone and never was, and the EPA has always known it."
No!
"I can tell you that the evidence for global warming is far weaker than its proponents would ever admit."
Nooo!
"I can tell you the percentage the US land area that is taken by urbanization, including cities and roads, is 5%."
Noooooo!
"I can tell you that the Sahara desert is shrinking, and the total ice of Antarctica is increasing."
No no noooooo!
"I can tell you that a blue-ribbon panel in Science magazine concluded that there is no known technology that will enable us to halt the rise of carbon dioxide in the 21st century."
Heretic!
"I can cite the appropriate journal articles not in whacko magazines, but in the most prestigious science journals, such as Science and Nature. But such references probably won't impact more than a handful of you, because the beliefs of a religion are not dependent on facts, but rather are matters of faith. Unshakeable belief."
Yup. Facts are irrelevant.
"We need to stop the mythic fantasies, and we need to stop the doomsday predictions. We need to start doing hard science instead."
Fat chance.
"Environmentalism has already killed somewhere between 10-30 million people since the 1970s."
People have never truely mattered to the enviromarxists.
"I am thoroughly sick of politicized so-called facts that simply aren't true. It isn't that these "facts" are exaggerations of an underlying truth. Nor is it that certain organizations are spinning their case to present it in the strongest way. Not at all---what more and more groups are doing is putting out is lies, pure and simple. Falsehoods that they know to be false."
This is the modern environmental movement to a tee.
"The EPA is hopelessly politicized. In the wake of Carol Browner, it is probably better to shut it down and start over."
Better to just shut it down, period.
"And if we allow science to become politicized, then we are lost. We will enter the Internet version of the dark ages, an era of shifting fears and wild prejudices, transmitted to people who don't know any better."
These are the environmentalists... people who don't know any better.
Anyone who hasn't should read Crighton's "State of Fear" book. Give it to you envirocommie friends.
ping
I glad that we live in this most perfect of all perfect worlds, but please spare me another Michael Crighton book!
I think I would rather eat Al Gore!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.