The Right’s War On Science

Over the past few years, it has been disappointing to listen as one lawmaker after another uttered the “I’m not a scientist” refrain to sow doubt about climate change, when no less than 97 percent of actively publishing climate scientists agree that warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities.

On Saturday, negotiators from 195 countries passed a landmark agreement at the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Paris, under which nearly every country committed to lowering greenhouse gas emissions. 

Some observers, including Bill McKibben, a professor of environmental studies and founder of the 350.org campaign, criticized the accord as falling far short of what is needed, after years of inaction, to preclude catastrophic warming. But the Paris agreement also represented a historic change that, if it goes according to plan, will hasten a global shift from coal and oil to renewable, emission-free energy sources. 

Alas, too many in Washington and elsewhere remain in deep denial at best, beholden to their fossil-fuel industry benefactors at worst. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, noted that this country’s participation in the accord “is subject to being shredded in 13 months,” when a new president takes office. And just as prevailing winds carry toxic emissions from coal-fired power plants across state lines, the noxious fumes concentrated on Capitol Hill sometimes drift into faraway lands. Such was the case on Dec. 7 as members of the House of Representatives’ Committee on Natural Resources held a field hearing on Atlantic fisheries in Riverhead. 

Representative Rob Bishop of Utah, the committee’s chairman, set the tone when he told a panel of seven witnesses that he was eager to hear their testimony, “even from those of you whose testimony will be wrong.” It quickly became apparent that the primary target of his scorn was for science itself, as embodied in Paul Rago, the branch chief of the Northeast Fisheries Science Center, an agency of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 

Jumping into the fray, Representative Tom MacArthur, who said that commercial fishing is responsible for 38,000 jobs and $9.3 billion in economic activity in his state, New Jersey, attempted to cast doubt on NOAA’s methodology, repeatedly questioning Dr. Rago as to whether and to what extent climate science influences its fisheries assessments. His implication was clear: Scientists, like government itself, are untrustworthy. 

Mr. Bishop, who had already pronounced that “science is not necessarily objective,” could not conclude the hearing without a last effort to discredit NOAA. In a discussion of the Marine National Monument Program, he asked, “Shouldn’t we continue to work these complex habitat issues through some established, transparent process, rather than having unilateral administrative action?” When Dr. Rago did not provide the hoped-for response, an annoyed Mr. Bishop cut him off. “Let me answer it for you: It’s stupid to do it unilaterally.” 

Representative Jared Huffman, representing the north coast of California, was the committee’s lone defender of a conservative approach to fisheries management. The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, criticized by some of the witnesses, is working, he said. “We now have the lowest number of overfished stocks in history, and many stocks are on a positive rebuilding path,” obviously in the long-term economic interest of coastal communities. Science, it seems, is working.

“A strong coastal economy cannot be based on an empty ocean,” Mr. Huffman said, imploring his colleagues to let science, including climate science, guide policy. The non-scientists in Congress and at all levels of government would be wise to heed that advice.