I must confess to being surprised that a former Progressive Conservative politician like Ken Allred has followed in the footsteps of the former New Democrat politician Stephen Lewis who once stated: “I am not an expert … but I have never allowed an absence of knowledge to impede an opinion.” While Mr. Lewis made this remark somewhat tongue-in-cheek, the same cannot be said of Mr. Allred who has offered his opinion with a very obvious absence of knowledge. While opinions are an integral part of human interaction, and abound in the world of politics, they have little use or value in the world of science. Science, by its very nature, requires objectivity and systematic study. The scientific theories, principles, understandings, models, etc. arising from this objective and systematic study are generally subject to ongoing scientific scrutiny, testing and refinement based on new data and deeper understandings. I view this as healthy scientific skepticism.
This is much different than Ken Allred’s skepticism, which is just an opinion. Saying that the “science is not proven” is meaningless. Science is a process and our scientific understanding today is what it is and it very, very clearly points to anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases as having an impact on climate and weather. What is uncertain is exactly how significant human influences are or may be relative to natural influences. Addressing this issue has been a focus of the IPCC since its inception in 1988 and I’m not sure why this gives Mr. Allred so much angst. Surely understanding the relative contribution of human influences on past, current and future climate is critical in determining whether or not we need to be worried about what we are doing today and what actions we need to consider to mitigate potentially significant adverse impacts. Again, and unfortunately, the science indicates that our human influence on the climate over the next few centuries is likely to be large unless we reduce emissions. That is the current state of scientific knowledge whether we like it or not. What you do with that scientific information is another matter altogether and if Mr. Allred thinks that adaptation should be the focus rather than emission reduction then he should provide a rationale and logical argument for this – not just opinion – and there can be an informed debate on this option.
I note Mr. Allred in his second commentary piece refers to Freeman Dyson as an open-minded scientist that he will listen to. I’ve been a big follower of Freeman Dyson and have read all his books; however, on climate change he has very clearly stated that he is not an expert. He once indicated that the climate change modelling was wrong and he would prove it – he tried but couldn’t. This type of skepticism and action is positive. One of the early co-chairs of the IPCC Scientific Assessment Working Group was Sir John Houghton, an eminent atmospheric physicist at Oxford University. He wrote a book entitled: Global Warming: The Complete Briefing. This book covers almost all of the issues that Mr. Allred’s commentary pieces and subsequent letters have raised and I would urge anyone that really wants to understand the science of climate change to read this book, which is very balanced and non-positional.
David Spink, St. Albert
