OPINION

Global Warming Debunked by Intelligent Design

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.

Global warming has long been used to justify burdensome regulations that increase costs, increases unemployment, increases dependency on government, and reduces our individual freedom.

Now, a recent global warming propaganda "study" says that meteorological and climate events over the last few years are so statistically rare that they must be man-made global warming.  Translation: Global warming has been debunked by science.

“The relentless, weather-gone-crazy type of heat that has blistered the United States and other parts of the world in recent years is so rare that it can't be anything but man-made global warming, says a new statistical analysis from a top government scientist.

The research by a man often called the "godfather of global warming" says that the likelihood of such temperatures occurring from the 1950s through the 1980s was rarer than 1 in 300. Now, the odds are closer to 1 in 10, according to the study by NASA scientist James Hansen. He says that statistically what's happening is not random or normal, but pure and simple climate change…

"Rather than say, 'Is this because of climate change?' That's the wrong question. What you can say is, 'How likely is this to have occurred with the absence of global warming?' It's so extraordinarily unlikely that it has to be due to global warming," Weaver said.” (NBC)

This is an amazing scientific capitulation.  This is an admission that science hasn’t been able to conclusively prove anything when it comes to global warming and/or its causes.  They haven’t been able to link specific droughts or hurricanes to global warming, and haven’t been able to pin a bad fire season on it.  The climate is just so complex that scientists haven’t been able to understand all the variables and how they interact… much less the source of any changes to those variables.

So, instead, the “godfather of global warming” has essentially said, “Nope, we can’t figure out the puzzle because it’s too complex.  But statistically this is so unusual that it must be man-made global warming.”

Welcome to the world of Intelligent Design, Mr. Hansen.

Intelligent Design is a theory that competes with evolution.  It states that many aspects of what we see in the species are too rare to be the result of anything other than a deliberate intelligent design.  In other words, it wasn’t random mutations that evolved the species but a guiding hand implementing a purposeful intelligent design.  While the theory doesn’t purport to define the “intelligence” that guided the changes to the species (could be God, could be aliens, as far as the theory is concerned), the implications are obvious.

While supporters of Intelligent Design have made many scientific arguments in favor of the theory, those arguments have been faced with objection from the more traditional “scientific community.”  That’s healthy.  Science is supposed to be about proposing theories and then others trying to tear it down.  So for every argument an Intelligent Design supporter offers, an evolutionist will offer a counter-argument. 

This has led to another approach for some supporters of Intelligent Design. 

Rather than trying to prove something that cannot be scientifically proven (because there is no way to truly reproduce a test condition), they have taken to analyzing the issue statistically.  They assign what they consider to be reasonable odds for various events taking place, and then use statistics to calculate the probability that those things could have all happened to produce the species we see around us.

But this statistical approach to the theory of Intelligent Design has long been disparaged by traditional scientists.  One paper wrote criticizing the statistical approach to Intelligent Design wrote:

“The biosphere, even with all its marvels, as far as is now known very probably can be a simple accident; we mortals have no reason to reject such a presumption

Another stated:

“The weakness is that statistical associations are not reliable indicators of causality.”

Another critique of statistics used to support Intelligent Design wrote:

“Probability and statistics are well developed disciplines with wide applicability to many branches of science, and it is not surprising that elaborate probabilistic arguments against evolution have been attempted. Careful evaluation of these arguments, however, reveals their inadequacies.

Now the “godfather of global warming” is resorting to the same types of statistics to make the case for global warming.  He explicitly says that the scientific community has been asking the wrong question—rather than trying to scientifically explain how any given event is a result of global warming (something that they don’t have the scientific knowledge to explain), the better question is to ask whether it’s statistically possible for the event to not be a result of global warming.

We find ourselves in a situation where if this global warming paper—based on statistics—is embraced by the media and/or the scientific community, the media and scientific community must also embrace the statistical arguments in favor of Intelligent Design.

So liberals have to pick their poison: 1) Accept the death of global warming because it’s being supported by the same arguments as Intelligent Design. 2) Accept Intelligent Design because it’s supported by the same arguments as global warming.

The more likely outcome is, of course, that this is just another one or two-day fluff piece to be promoted by the media to plant seeds of support in the minds of readers that don’t consider the wider implications of the assertion.  Given this now “scientific” paradox between global warming and Intelligent Design, it’s safe to say that future global warming “science” won’t be built on this statistical paper.

But, regardless, what we can conclude is that global warming “science” is dead.  They’ve given up on fudge-factor-filled climate models.  They’ve given up trying to scientifically explain how it’s really possible for humans to have the impact they say we have on the climate.  They’ve simply given up.  Instead, they want us to trust their statistics.

Global warming has been dying a slow death for years.  But global warming is now dead.

And, ironically, it was killed by the arguments liberals use against Intelligent Design.