In their letters to the editor, Ann Luckett (“Harris, coalition don’t have valid opinion,” May 20), Luke Evslin (“Balance climate change coverage,” May 21) and Richard J. Laue (“The climate is changing, so wake up,” May 22), demonstrate perfectly the logical fallacies — errors in reasoning — that are ruining the climate debate:
Ad hominem — against the man, instead of the idea: Luckett and Laue refer to those of us who dispute the causes of climate change as “climate change deniers.” The “deniers” label is an attempt to portray us as being as misguided as Holocaust deniers so readers will discount our opinions, a reprehensible tactic that has no place in civilized discourse.
Straw man — attributing nonsensical arguments to one’s opponent, arguments that they did not make, and then attacking them for these assertions: As I explained in my article, we deny that we deny climate change. We merely question its causes, as all scientifically minded people should.
Motive intent — ascribing motive to an advocate so as to discredit their opinion: Evslin says I am a “fossil fuel and tobacco industry lobbyist” and that I get “paid a lot of money simply to muddy the debate on climate change.” Laue refers to ICSC as a “front group” and says that I have been “head of PR for Canadian energy companies.” Luckett directs readers to a group that make similar charges.
Besides the fact that all of these charges are 100 percent false (I have never worked for energy companies, have never lobbied for anyone, helped get smoking banned on long haul flights when I worked as an airworthiness engineer, and cannot afford to live in Hawaii on my salary), they assume that readers will conclude that what we say must be wrong because we supposedly have a motivation to lie, a juvenile argument indeed.
Guilt by association: Laue demonstrates this fallacy when he tries to link ICSC to groups that he apparently does not like, as if that somehow shows that our opinions about science should not be considered by right-minded people.
Appeal to authority: This is apparently a favourite of Evslin. In support of his position, he cites everyone from the president to the pope to the IMF and the World Bank (entities that have no special knowledge about climate) as well as various national science academies that have not even demonstrated that a majority of their own scientist members agree with their proclamations. Regardless, appealing to authority is not an acceptable substitute for thinking for oneself about questions such as why global warming stopped over 17 years ago while carbon dioxide levels continued to rise. Even a mechanical engineer like myself (one who has taught 1,500 students at Carleton University in Ottawa about climate science) has no difficulty recognizing the inconsistency between the observational data and the theory that is driving the climate scare.
Red herring — citing circumstances that are unrelated to the topic of debate: Evslin’s repeated reference to tobacco obviously falls into this category. So does his reference to the fact that only one research paper in a survey disputed the idea that “the planet is warming and humans are causing it.” The issue at hand is whether our greenhouse gas emissions are causing climate change dangerous enough to warrant massive expenditures to try to stop. Very few, if any, of the papers analyzed in the survey would have an opinion one way or the other on the topic since most would be focussed on more tightly defined topics of research. Laue’s reference to climate change in Hawaii is also a red herring since he does not address the causes of those changes.
Cheery picking — the fallacy of incomplete evidence: Evslin commits this error when he directs readers to U.S. government websites for supposedly independent verification of the government’s position on climate change. Such bodies will obviously agree with their political masters on this and, in fact, all issues. That is why the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change is so important — it is free to conclude whatever the scientists involved find, politically correct or not.
Appeal to emotion: Luckett, Evslin and Laue clearly hope that readers share their outrage that I challenged the fashionable view on climate change. But that is what true science is all about — challenging, probing, always questioning. When this stops, science becomes dogma and we risk returning to the time of the Inquisition when heretics were burned at the stake for daring to express contrary points of view.
Perhaps their emotional reaction to my article is what prevented these writers from properly checking out my background before launching their attacks. Perhaps that it why they appear to have not considered whether the fashionable approach to climate change actually makes sense: of the approximately $1 billion a day now being spent worldwide on climate finance, a mere 6 percent of it is spent helping populations prepare for climate change that, regardless of its causes, is hurting people, especially the poor, right now.
The rest is spent trying to stop what might happen decades from now. Opinion leaders from across the political spectrum are starting to see this as immoral, effectively valuing the lives of people yet to be born more than those suffering today.
• Tom Harris is executive director of the Ottawa, Canada-based International Climate Science Coalition.
