The debate surrounding global warming is primarily a struggle over competing visions of human agency. Are humans responsible for global warming or not? Some say “yes,” others say “no.”
If you keep up with the debate over global warming, combatants have largely staked out positions around the ‘scientific evidence.’ There is much faith placed in ‘scientific evidence’ as the ultimate site of arbitration. The argument seems to be that an ethical decision is not called for because the ‘scientific evidence’ will give us the answer about which way to go.
For instance, Al Gore and many other proponents of the global warming thesis rally around the ‘scientific evidence’ in An Inconvenient Truth. For folks like Gore and Brian McLaren, another important proponent of the global warming thesis, the ‘scientific evidence’ is clear about what is going on—the world is getting warmer because of man and so it is man’s responsibility to do something about it.
On the other side of the debate, however, are opponents of the global warming thesis. They have the ’scientific evidence’ on their side too. For instance, Kelly Boggs, writing for LifeWay, offers an example of this position. She laments that so many corporations and people are falling for the “politically correct hysteria over man-made global warming.” As she puts it, “[d]espite the fact that many scientists offer evidence that counters the theory of man-made global warming, many stubbornly believe it’s true.” In other words, the world may or may not be getting warmer; either way, it is not man’s responsibility.
In both instances, proponents and opponents of the global warming thesis argue that ‘scientific evidence’ is on their side of the debate and that this evidence basically makes the moral choice for them. Stacked up, both Gore and Boggs would say the ‘scientific evidence’ is clear about which way to go. The problem is that they interpret the ’scientific evidence’ very differently and so there policies are pointed in two very different directions.
Ultimately, I argue, the ‘scientific evidence’ that both opponents and proponents appeal to is best seen as a rhetorical commonplace used to prop up their competing positions. As I see it, the real debate is not about ‘scientific evidence.’ Rather, Gore and Boggs symbolize two visions of human agency. On Gore’s view, man is an agent that can cause the problem and find a solution to the problem. On Bogg’s view, man is neither an agent that can cause the problem nor an agent that can fix it.
So, I don’t think that the issue of global warming or the problem of how humans should respond will be resolved by appeals to the ‘scientific evidence.’ The ‘scientific evidence’ is a rhetorical means to a larger end—namely, two competing visions of human agency.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
I’m not sure I understand how this means that it ceases to be a scientific problem. How do we decide between these ‘two competing visions of human agency’ without consulting scientific evidence? Suppose I wake up one morning and find that a window downstairs has been broken. How do I determine whether it was caused by the kids I heard shouting in the street around midnight or by the storm that blew up a couple of hours later? I have to find some scientific evidence - perhaps a brick on the living room carpet, or CCTV footage.
My wife and I might disagree over the cause and use scientific arguments ‘rhetorically’ to prop up our competing positions. But ultimately the question of cause or responsibility - and the various other questions that derive from that such as ‘will the insurers pay for it?’ or ‘how do we stop it happening again?’ - cannot be resolved on a philosophical level. It remains fundamentally a question of what actually happened.
There have been countless scientific debates over the years that at some point or other have looked like mere polemics, when supposed scientific evidence appears to have been subordinated to rhetoric, but in the end the matter has been settled empirically.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
By what method do you separate out the rhetoric from the scientific evidence? Does the scientific evidence impose itself on you leading to a necessary outcome that is separate from the rhetoric by which it is marshaled? Does what "really happened" seep into your mind without the use of language?
It seems to me that the answer is clear: you cannot seperate the rhetoric from the evidence—or at least no one has developed a method that I am aware of; no evidence imposes itself on you and leads to a necessary outcome—or we would see everyone in agreement; and what really happened cannot be grasped without the use of language—knowledge cannot be conveyed without some sort of human mediation.
It just seems to me that ultimately, unmediated scientific evidence is not the arbiter—scientific evidence is part of the rhetorical fodder. People have to make choices and those choices are rooted in a philosophical/theological position that gives some piece of evidence meaning—hence, the struggles of interpretation over just what the scientific evidence means.
I am not a scientific realist. Why? Because scientific realism, like theological realism, attempts to remove the human work from the equation and get at some unmediated “reality” that lays beneath it all.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
That is beyond dispute - as long as you include the word ‘unmediated’. But in the ‘real’ world we happily, and for the most part unthinkingly, act on the basis of what we take to be evidence - scientific or otherwise. Of course, the evidence is thoroughly wrapped up in perception and rhetoric and what have you. But that does not invalidate it as evidence - it just makes it harder to know what’s trustworthy. You can only object to scientific realism on theoretical grounds. In practice, we are all scientific realists.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
Is it really beyond dispute?
“Most working scientists hold fast to the concept of ‘realism’—a viewpoint according to which an external reality exists independent of observation. But quantum physics has shattered some of our cornerstone beliefs.”
For the rest of the abstract see here:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v446/n7138/abs/nature05677.html
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
Thanks, shiert. You’re right. Quantum mechanics have really shaken up peoples’ thinking on issues like this.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
Actually, you can object to scientific realism in philosophy and practice. There are various sub-disciplines within sociology and, more recently, political science that do this. Generally, it is called ethnomethodology—that is, the study of peoples’ everyday practices. The aim of these studies are to closely examine how people use taken for granted concepts, like "evidence" or "truth" or "terrorism" or "objectivity" or any number of other taken for granted concepts, to make sense of and construct their everyday life. See for instance: Bruno Latour’s seminal studies, Science in Action and Laboratory Life. Other key authors include Harold Garfinkel, Douglas Maynard, Lene Hansen, etc.
It is a mistake to suggest that at rock bottom we are all realists.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
“In practice, we are all scientific realists.”
Does scientific realism have a history? Or is it a grand metaphysical abstraction that all must ultimately submit to regardless of their times and places in history?
It seems to me that the development of scientific realism has a history. It also seems to me that you have conflated your particular interpretive lens (scientific realism) for the basic nature of human beings. That is basically my qualms with structural approaches such as yours.
If we all are ultimately scientific realists, then it seems to me that we lack agency. In your view, can I not be a scientific realist?
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
Jacob, in an attempt to use narrative science rather than grand meta-physical abstractions, consider the following story:
This is not about whether our culture or the words we use or our size can affect some aspects of how we understand the world. This is about whether we can live under water or not. Neither rhetoric nor quantum mechanics will give you gills.
All creatures are realists, living by acting on relationships between situations and later events. Any creatures that cease to be realists die. I guess that is one cause/effect relationship that I hope my kids don’t have to see in consequence of people ignoring the evidence that is in front of us now.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
An interesting parable, Richard. I am wondering if we might not have a definitional problem here as between empiricism and realism. The definition of realism as used in science and philosophy is actually counterintuitive. We are not talking about local here and now so much as the unobservable, there and now which we hold to be reality.
Having watched Jacob work, I am not optimistic that if he decides to take up your parable, it will survivr close scrutiny.
I am thinking Heidegger has something to say about the everydayness of existence that might speak to the issue you raised and cause and effect.
It would be nice if things could be so simple that the mere description of how we, as human beings, experience and react to the material world on a day-to-day basis was enough to be satisfying. Problem is, this is only a small portion of what we as human beings experience as “life,” and leaves open the question regarding the unobservable, say—God for instance.
Re: Global Warming and Competing Visions of Human Agency
A few comments:
1) It is ironic that you use a parable, which is a kind of narrative, to convince me of the validity of scientific realist accounts of the world. In this way, we see how the counterintuitive characteristics of scientific realism depend on narrative. Narratives and stories, like Jesus sitting on a rock and telling stories to his disciples and the gathering crowds or the Bible from which we read of this encounter, are more fundamental than scientific realism and appeals to an objective world out there that we somehow grasp.
2) Take a close look at my original essay. I am not talking about the objective world out there. Rather, I am talking about peoples’ competing interpretations of their environment. So, in some sense, we are talking about two different things. You are talking about an objective world out there, while I am talking about peoples’ interpretations.
3). I do not claim anything about what rhetoric or quantum mechanics will do. In some sense, I feel like you are arguing against a straw man of which you constructed.
4). To avoid the problem of a strawman, why don’t ou start by answering the questions I asked Andrew in my above responses? I think they are relevant questions that pose some seriouis challenges to your interpretation and philosophical realism more generally. Asserting the validity of philosophical realism does not answer these questions and it does not engage my argument.
5). My paper was about human agency. Some people believe that we are not responsible for global warming and we can’t do anything about it anyway, while other people believe that we are responsible for global warminig and can do something about it. You, like Andrew, fall into the latter camp—you think we can do something about it.
Now, I see you and Andrew has having one possible interpretation; you and Andrew see yourselves as having The Right Interpretation and you appeal to the "scientific evidence" as proving this.