Civil engineers work in the real world, building highways, railroads, bridges, tunnels, dams, and sewers (referred to collectively by certain other government employees as "targets"). If the CEs don't do their sums properly, they'll know it soon enough... as will we all.
There's substantially more wiggle room for the corporate lords of the EHS domain, who deal as much in politics as they do in real environmental, health, or safety problems.
But there's all of the great outdoors for academics, who rarely if ever actually do anything, and even less rarely are called to account for it.
So Prof. Allenby is understandably conflicted, having begun his career in one of the most practical disciplines and segued to one of the fluffiest fields.
On the one hand, he incorrectly and unscientifically assumes that "loss of biodiversity" and "climate change" are real problems that demand attention, all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding. Asking a question that contains its own answer (and that often assumes facts not in evidence) is called "begging the question," and the classic example is "When did you stop beating your wife?"
On the other hand, Allenby very properly points out that unscientific findings -- presented as "consensus" or "settled debate," when in fact they're nothing of the kind -- are being used to advance political agendas, and that the people floating those agendas are prepared to underwrite, very generously, "studies" that support predetermined conclusions... kind of like plinking randomly at the broad side of a barn and then painting perfectly centered bull's-eyes around each bullet-hole. This is precisely what happened with the report by the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, whose executive summary was written before the first temperature probe was unpacked.
The pencil-whipped results of cherry-picked studies are presented as authoritative, precluding any questioning or debate. In short, the heart of the scientific method -- the ongoing loop of hypothesis, testing, observation, challenge, and refined hypothesis that has driven Western technology for the last 400 years -- has been subordinated ("hijacked" wouldn't be too strong a word) to a particular purpose, to the point that blatantly un-scientific techniques, cloaked in a pretense of scientific objectivity, are now in the service of purely political ends.
If Prof. Allenby can unsnarl his contradictions, he might come up with even more worthwhile observations.
J'ai dit. Ça va?