suzionline

'if not for scientists, we would have far more death and disease at an earlier age than ever before.
We should be thankful for their amazing contributions to the health of humans, if nothing else.'

There is nothing in my post that would contradict what you have said. I have met many wonderful scientist whose goal is to help mankind rather than prove a fantasy.

you also write

'Really Runner? Far better that we believe the biggest fairy tail book of them all.....The Bible? '

you choose by faith to believe you come from an ape and I choose by faith to believe that I have a Creator. I know which faith based belief is more logical. And don't tell me that 'the science is settled'.

Dear mikk,

I can understand where you'e coming from.
Critics of scientists are often influenced
by other agendas then finding the "truth.'

However, I think historically -
discoveries that challenged important existing
assumptions or values have provoked intense controversy
or even resistance. In fact it's quite common for
a major new theory or discovery to cause an intellectual
scandal in the scientific community and in society beyond.

Darwin was reviled for his theory of evolution. Freud
was shouted down by his outraged colleagues. Galileo's
colleagues refused to look through his telescope
to see the moons of Jupiter. Giordano Bruno was burned
at the stake for proclaiming that the earth revolved
around the sun. Pasteur's germ theory was ignored by
surgeons of his time, who could have saved countless
lives simply by washing their hands and instruments
before operating on their patients - and the list goes on.

At the same time we shouldn't put scientists on a
pedestal either. Like any one else they
may be greedy, or as
ambitious as anyone else. There is some outright
fraud in science - deliberate bias, plagiarism,
suppression of inconvenient facts, bogus claims,
and even forgery of research results. There's also
competition. Professional recognition is very
important to a scientist. The university or college
scientist - particularly in the US must "publish or
perish."

However, where would we be without them?
The thought of the objective,
emotionally disinterested
scientist is a bit naive.
Like the rest of us they have their own private
values and prejudices, and they may be passionately
committed to particular viewpoints or theories -
but the world will always need new knowledge and
its eventual application to technology.

The best is yet to come.

Runner,
Fair suck of the celestial harp, old brimstone snorting seraphim (levitating person) first order ...those who see most clearly!

Evolution does NOT say we come from Apes! We come from a common ancestor a million years of difference.
Neither is it about the survival of the fittest! It says survival of the most adapted. Again about a millennium or five difference.
Both these myths/ miss quotations come from an Astronomer competitor of Darwin at the time(1800's).( a wanna be theologian and zealot) some of his views were weird for even then.

Next my old ecclesiastical enveloped Cherubim (chubby winged baby)Second order...fullness of knowledge). Your bible is well at best artificially selective i.e. there are some 20 other epistles books and gospels that were left out because they conflicted the religious (Catholic) teachings of the time.

The old testament is also taken out of context. Explain away the hundreds of contradictions that abound when compared to modern religion. It or rather they had an entirely different purpose than their use today. Ask a Jewish theologian.

As for the science being settled.....in the context that there will always be more to know exactly, but science is far more rationally able to explain existence/life than some male commanding once every day for six days then taking a (sickie?) day of (from the stress hard work? all that commanding).

In short my ethereally minded Angel(winged person?) - ninth order ...individual affairs of mankind, religion including Christianity, emotionally satisfying to some, but logical

You're right again mikk.

I've noticed that, undoubtedly as part of the spin campaign against action to ameliorate AGW, there's recently been a lot of ill-informed and quite vicious disinformation being spread against scientists.

As I've said before at OLO, I've worked with many scientists and used to be one myself. I don't know any of my former colleagues who lives the kind of materially profligate lifestyle that is normally associated with more than an average income. To suggest that scientists in general are in it for the money is really a poor joke.

Like any profession, there's a few whose behaviour is ethically wanting, but I really think that this line of attack by the denialist contingent is one of their weakest.

Of course, there's a sizeable proportion of AGW denialists who, through a combination of ignorance and selfishness, will leap on anything attacking the messengers like hyenas on carcass. Unfortunately, that's because AGW is now far more of an issue politically and economically than it is in scientific terms.

Examinator - I think we all know that runner doesn't understand evolution, or anything much else outside of his fundamentalist Christian perspective.

He does, however, perform the useful function of providing a few chuckles in otherwise serious discussions :)

Thanks CJ and Foxy as usual you put it far better than I could. Foxy your post brought to mind a saying I heard somewhere.

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident."

I hope the current furor is as violent as it gets and we get to stage three soon.