Image: Anthony Watts
Allow me to share with you a speech given by one of my sound colleagues here in the European Parliament. Derk Jan Eppink is a Dutch national representing Belgium who sits with us in our Euro-sceptic ECR group. He delivered this speech, entitled “A religion without a God” at a book launch for “Blauwe Planeet” – the newest book by Czech President, and fellow climate realist, Vaclav Klaus. – Roger Helmer MEP
At the occasion of launching Blauwe Planeet
By Derk Jan Eppink
May 25 2011
A religion without a God
Last weekend on May 21, American Christian preacher Harold Camping, once again encountered his ‘Disappointment Day’. For years he announced the end of times, predicting May 21 to be Judgment Day. On that day, the world would be destroyed and only ‘a chosen few’ would make it to heaven.
On Judgment Day, the preacher took a seat in front of his television to await news events. He expected a live report of CNN covering a wave of earthquakes that ultimately would lead to global demise.
But nothing happened.
Instead, CNN focused on the Frenchman Dominique Strauss-Kahn who lost his way and senses in a New York hotel room. For ‘DSK’ indeed, the world collapsed. The preacher was disappointed that apocalypses remained confined to only one person and possibly some of his friends in Paris belonging to la gauche caviar. The preacher fled to a motel to escape international media.
Generally, the advantage of religion is that you do not have to take ‘facts’ into account. Like doomsday announcer Camping, you simply believe and preach, hoping that facts will follow. Western political elites live in a secularized world, a world without God. But religion – a matter of belief – does apparently remain a need of human mankind. In particular, progressive political elites have abolished God, while clinging to notoriously religious features like ‘fear’, ‘guilt’, ‘final judgement’, ‘redemption’, ‘sin’ and ‘salvation’, as part of their political philosophies.
God is gone, but the rest stayed on. Climate Change is just an example of this phenomenon. The concept can only be effective if there is ‘guilt’ (politically incorrect behaviour of human mankind), ‘fear’ (doomsday), if there is ‘sin’ (acts of unprincipled unbelievers), and finally salvation (brought about by the NGO´s of the Green Movement). And if there is somehow a substitute Jesus on top, as impersonated by Al Gore, secular religion gets rooted in political communities trying to turn it into public policy all people have to adhere to.
It takes courage to withstand religion-based political philosophies. You will be depicted as a heretic, as anti-human, as narrow-minded, as autistic and stupid. In fact, like in theocracies any opponent should be dispatched to the dustbin of history. When climate change was minted into religion and subsequently put on the political agenda, carefully orchestrated by celebrities and media consultants, it became a wave of self-righteousness. There was no way to escape.
Yet a few risk-daring politicians rose to the occasion. The first was Vaclav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic and a dissident by inclination. He simply raised factual questions secularized religions can hardly cope with.
That is what he did with Communism which was, after all, an elaborated quasi-religious philosophy pretending to lead human mankind to the ‘Promised Land’ on Earth. And here again, even as President of an EU member state he challenged the fundamentals of a policy pretending to save the world from Doomsday.
Many politicians publish books. Very often, these books are written by other people. Very often, these books are glossy and self-glorifying. Very often, these books make no impact whatsoever and they are finally shelved in the basement of the party headquarter. Mostly, these books are dead upon arrival in the bookstore.
Klaus takes on nonsensical thinking regardless of the status of the author himself. In 2009, he visited the European Parliament to tell his audience that they were ‘disconnected’ from reality. He stated that a Parliament without a legitimate opposition is not really a Parliament. In fact, it is a church singing the gospel of the ‘ever closer Union’. Some members were shocked, left the Plenary and started crying in the corridor. Yesterday, Ivo Belet one of those weeping members, published an opinion article in a Flemish newspaper denouncing NVA-figurehead Bart De Wever for meeting the Anti-Christ from the Czech Republic. Belet, a slavish poodle of EU figureheads, is barking up the wrong tree. The European elite demand flattery and praise; not to criticism, let alone unconventional thinking.
It takes courage to challenge fashionable thinking. For 5 years, I worked in the cabinet of former Commissioner Frits Bolkestein. The Dutch Commissioner was a non federalist and a climate change sceptic in the Commission. For most of his colleagues he was the ‘devil in disguise’. You can imagine the bumpy ride he had in Brussels; he was a ‘non believer’ in a church of devoted federalists.
Once he got a letter from former Belgian Commissioner, Etienne Davignon, a self-appointed viceroy of the United States of Belgium, who said that a non federalist should not be member of the European Commission. He demanded a purge to restore the purity of the Institution.
Ten years ago, Bolkestein publicly said that the Euro would derail if not underpinned by sound monetary policy and iron-clad criteria of the Stability and Growth Pact. He also stated that a common EU immigration policy based on unenforced external borders would generate a political backlash beyond belief. He was laughed at. But now, the political elite of the EU is not laughing anymore. They wasted ten years of policy-making and still, they would rather drive into a brick wall than to admit that they made mistakes.
Jean Marie Dedecker equally has the courage to stick out his neck. As a former Judo player and coach he is not risk adverse. On the contrary, he likes the fray and smashing his opponents on the ground, sooner the better.
And that is precisely why he has written the introduction to the Dutch version of the book President Klaus is launching here today. He belonged to the first in Belgium to challenge the preachers of doom and climate change. Belgium only recently abolished God, and for those who were still in doubt some catholic leaders and priests did the rest.
Flanders was in urgent need for a religious substitute that would be able to micromanage the lives of the people. Obviously, Dedecker was vilified by the political elites and the media which had turned into an extension of the green movement and its preachers in politics.
Both Klaus and Dedecker focused on facts, rather than on speculation and emotional manipulation. They challenged the issues head-on by raising difficult questions, and by doing so they gradually saw the narrative of climate change unravel. Later on, a series of scandals revealed that so-called scientific researchers had manipulated their work in order to serve the dogmas of their beliefs. The Copenhagen Summit resulted in failure and, demonstrations against climate change even had to be cancelled because it was to cold and frosty in the Danish capital.
Now, climate change does not have that mythical spot on the political agenda it had a few years ago. However, it remains on the agenda of political elites in the EU. Some people really do believe; others simply pretend in order to sustain a quasi-progressive image. But the man in the street never embraced climate change and why? The climate has been changing as long as there is a climate, even in times in which people were running around naked and living in caves. One slight change in the activity of the Sun has an impact on the entire [solar system]. Human behaviour is just one of the many elements. Therefore, the religious zeal did not stick because ‘human guilt’ could not be established. And ‘guilt’ is what it takes to make a religion work, even a religion without a God.
Therefore, a democracy needs people like Klaus and Dedecker, people who speak out when nobody does, people who stand out when others follow the flow and people who lash out when many bend towards submission. This book will certainly be a much welcome recipe against political overheating in Flanders and the reality-check which is the necessary basis for any sound public policy.
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John B says:
May 27, 2011 at 12:58 pm
I guess I’m a “luke warmist” – somewhere in the middle. I see at least as many religious traits among skeptics as I do among the warmista.
Unfortunately, John, in concluding that you are a “luke warmist”, you are trying to answer the wrong question – which is apparently something like, “Which side’s members – ‘skeptical’ or ‘warmista’ – more demonstrate to you the actions of people practicing a Religion?”
But that question has nothing to do with the validity or factual nature of the hypotheses advanced in regard to the various ideas involved with Catastrophic Anthropogenic/CO2 Global Warming, as ostensibly framed by “Climate Science”.
In other words, the real question you need to answer is solely scientific. Therefore, instead, the first relevant point to recognize is that the ipcc’s CO2=CAGW Climate Science very objectively does not practice real, scientific method and principle, science. Then continue from there, along the threads which stick to the practice of real science, to decide whether you are a “luke warmer”, or whatever.
Otherwise, why bother to take a position on CO2=CAGW?
David says:
May 27, 2011 at 10:47 am
“All good stuff. You really have to ask, though – why have politicians (with the notable exception of Vaclav Claus and a few others) swallowed this stuff so completely..?”
Because of the success of Anti-Smoking Hysteria. In unguarded moments, one published recently here, Hansen pines for the Eighties and the great victories over Big Tobacco. The communists recognized the tool, they have used it effectively, and it has given them new life – as Grandiose Community Organizers.
Wycliffe inspired another ‘Czech’, then Bohemia, John Huss: http://www.manchesterorange.co.uk/Religion/john-huss-reformer
I agree that Senator Inhofe and Dr. Spencer are stalwart champions of science and reason, standing tall against the rampant, agenda-driven ideology of the Enviro-zealots.
But they are overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of the establishment orthodoxy: politicians, bureaucrats, academics, and the press. Listen, in the New Jersey thread, to the current darling of the right, Gov. Christie, repeat the litany of the Climatists, as if from scripture.
When I asked, “Where is the Vaclav Klaus of the United States?” I meant, where is the one leader decrying the hoax whom the press and the rest of the establishment cannot ignore, and can only disparage at their peril?
What if a leading presidential candidate were to stand up and declare this? “Contrary to the Alarmists, CO2 is not a pollutant, and not a problem. There is nothing so special about our current climate that a little change wouldn’t hurt. Once upon a time the Sahara was green, and so was Greenland! But really, there is no measurable effect on the Earth’s many climates from burning fossil fuels, and there is boundless benefit from the abundance of affordable energy that fossil fuels provide. The Establishment is wrong. They want you to stop human progress in its tracks, to condemn the Third World to perpetual poverty, and to promise nothing to your grandchildren but forty acres and a mule, and a small windmill to pump their water. That is not what I want for my children, my grandchildren, my country, and my world, and if elected, I will not let it happen!”
I like to think that this candidate would get elected overwhelmingly.
/Mr Lynn
By 1990 the environmentalist movement had legs and respectability–it was conventional wisdom, endorsed by every right-thinking person, especially in academia and among the anointed in various gatekeeper positions, and especially in the MSM. It acquired lots of money with alarmist predictions from a mass of responsible wealthy people in their bequests, from charitable foundations, and in government funding. It demonstrated its willingness and ability to effectively smear and steamroller opponents in earlier battles over polution limits, the spotted owl, etc.
In 2000 the Green Party candidate in the US won enough votes to deny Gore the election. Democrats noticed that endorsing Green positions won them the votes of swing voters (e.g., people like the Packards, etc.), and therefore started winning elections when they made an issue of their more aggressive environmental policies than their opponents–who were then forced to move closer to their positions, or soften their opposition. The same thing happened in Europe.
Most scientists who enter any field associated with environmentalism do so because of a strong pro-nature/anti-human-impact bias, one that is strengthened by all they are taught in school, read in their journals, hear in their lounges, etc. Those who get studies funded do so with the expectation that these will be alarmist–if nothing alarming is found, there is no real “finding,” after all, so it’s just a non-news, dog-bites-man story.
Also, it is difficult for a politician to challenge the believers, since they confidently spin out unending streams of intimidating, sciency-sounding baffle-gab at the drop of a hat. I’m sure this is what swayed Cameron, Gingrich, etc.
These factors, plus half-a-dozen more, like the sin-redemption psychological dynamic at work, combined to form a perfect storm in the West. Skeptical politicians just took cover in their storm cellars.
Wondering Aloud says:
May 27, 2011 at 9:49 am
“I think a huge part of the problem is money. Richard Lindzen was right 25 years ago when he called it the New McCarthyism. Perhaps most proponents do not have sinister intent but there are literally thousands of jobs tied to climate change alarmism.”
Yep. Humanities and Social Sciences professors are getting grants (big bucks) by the armload and spreading the gospel of climate change. If you have a child in public secondary school, you know that huge federal dollars are backing teaching of global warming.
@PhilJourdon
If skeptics are devoted to scientific principles, why do they rarely do any science? If you think “it’s the sun”, do some research. If you think “it’s volcanoes” or “it’s cosmic rays”, do some research. If it holds up, it will become accepted. That’s how science works. But it has to hold up. That’s why the oft quoted “global cooling scare” of the 1970’s, which was all based on one paper, went away. It didn’t hold up.
Of course, we can’t all do research, but we can all read about it. Go read the IPCC reports, not what bloggers have written about them. Go read some science papers or reviews of those papers intended for lay audiences, not what politically motivated bloggers have said about them. What you will find is that the science is (a) rather dry to read, (b) very measured in its conclusions, and (c) pretty much devoid of politics.
A plea to those whose minds are still open – read the “IPCC report summary for policy makers” for yourself. If you don’t like it, what have you lost? If you find yourself thinking, “hmm, this isn’t what I was expecting”, dig a little deeper.
Here’s the link:
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-spm.pdf
Declaration of interest right at the start: I am protestant, not creationist, a B.Sc Hons in biology, and fairly sceptical of CAGW on empirical grounds.
Excessive infatuation with CAGW can be found in both believers and non-believers. With non-believers this exemplifies the view attributed (perhaps apocryphally) to Chesterton: they stop believing in God and they start believing in anything.
But for believer and non-believer alike there is another pitfall in CAGW. It gives us a chance to feel that we can expiate our sins and achieve a spiritual catharsis by opposing CAGW. Confession is indeed good for the soul. But is CO2 a sin? This has to be left to the scientists – who haven’t done a very good job of analysing this.
In the interest of full disclosure Al Gore also flunked out of the Vanderbilt Law School.
You are in good company Mr Watts!
Wycliffe inspired another ‘Czech’, then Bohemia, John Huss: http://www.manchesterorange.co.uk/Religion/john-huss-reformer
John Elder says:
It gives us a chance to feel that we can expiate our sins and achieve a spiritual catharsis by opposing CAGW.
Not why I oppose it. When I began exploring it by asking questions of AGW supporters I very quickly realised that even those considering themselves scientists didn’t have any objectivity about it, a requisite I thought, not being a scientist myself, the benchmark for scientific thinking. That first inkling that it was all a product of mass hysteria and well-organised to be that is what has kept me interested in the arguments and in arguing against it, because it is so overwhelming in its scope. So not at all about “expiating sin”, whatever it is you mean by that, I’m supposing it’s tied in with the Western Christian Augustinian model, but of keeping a grip on my own sanity by trying to understand the arguments.
John B says:
A plea to those whose minds are still open – read the “IPCC report summary for policy makers” for yourself. If you don’t like it, what have you lost? If you find yourself thinking, “hmm, this isn’t what I was expecting”, dig a little deeper.
Hmmm, that would be the CAGW bible – based on pal-reviewed pseudoscience, faulty, even fraudulent “facts”, grey literature from NGO’s fully-invested in, and counting on the CAGW/CC gravy train continuing, and politics.
But, I guess you believe in Consensus Science, right?
JPeden says:
May 27, 2011 at 2:18 pm
“the first relevant point to recognize is that the ipcc’s CO2=CAGW Climate Science very objectively does not practice real, scientific method and principle, science.”
That sounds to me rather like a creationist saying “evolution isn’t real science”. Creationists say that because evolution offends their religious views. It seems to me that skeptics deny (yes, deny) the science because it offends their ideological views.
Show me where the science relayed by IPCC (for that is all the IPCC does) is not real science, but don’t fall into the trap of pointing to a single contrary paper or Op Ed piece and thinking that it brings down the whole edifice. That is also what creationists do.
BTW, you got me on the “luke warmist” bit. I shouldn’t have written that, it’s not relevant.
Despite the views of John B, the good thing about the new religion of AGW, is that real evidence will eventually trump exaggerated church-like (IPCC) propaganda (models), evidence that now appears to me to be avoided by the church hierarchy and their disciples, the media.
I have been hoping for a few degrees of warming for a long time, as I see so many benefits to society for a warmer world, but evidence tells me, as well as personal intuition, that it is not happening.
Anyway, climate changes over a century or more at the minimum, it’s natural cycles
that the AGW religion are preaching about today. Why else would they change terminology from CAGW to AGW to Climate change to Climate Disruption.
John B says:
May 27, 2011 at 4:33 pm
“Show me where the science relayed by IPCC (for that is all the IPCC does) is not real science, but don’t fall into the trap of pointing to a single contrary paper or Op Ed piece and thinking that it brings down the whole edifice. That is also what creationists do.”
As one who has had my own attempts at humor misunderstood around here, I’d suggest that you remember to include a sarc off tag when going for a joke, although that one was so completely hilarious that I can see how you would think it wasn’t necessary.
@Bruce Cobb
“Hmmm, that would be the CAGW bible – based on pal-reviewed pseudoscience, faulty, even fraudulent “facts”, grey literature from NGO’s fully-invested in, and counting on the CAGW/CC gravy train continuing, and politics.”
Yep, that’s the one 🙂 Now go read it for yourself, it’s only 18 pages. I did. I’m not a “believer”, I just find it harder to accept that 97% of climate scientists, plus the MSM other than Fox, plus all national and international science bodies, etc., etc. are in some sort of conspiracy than to accept that there might be some truth in it. After all, I accept relativity and evolution on the same basis.
John B says:
May 27, 2011 at 2:37 pm
A plea to those whose minds are still open – read the “IPCC report summary for policy makers” for yourself.
Yes, John, it is a pitiful document, indeed, just as it stands and stood there all by itself for some months. And I have no burning desire to rehash its multiple internal problems just because you are so far behind the curve.
But note this one feature of the SPM4, John – although it alone is neither necessary nor sufficient for proving the fact that ipcc CO2=CAGW Climate Science is not real, scientific method and principle science: since when has any truly scientific entity or operation ever published its so very controversial or potentially important results or conclusions – here the SPM4 – while not only not providing its scientific basis for the conclusions along with the conclusions – supposedly found in the rest of the AR4 as indicated by the SPM4’s totally unhinged reference numbers – but also delaying the publication of its actual “science” in support of the conclusions for three long months? I’d never thought such a thing would even be possible.
In fact, this peculiar Climate Science “method” itself only serves to alert anyone familiar with the practice of real science of the possibilities that, 1] ipcc Climate Science is not real science; and 2] that the tactic is also possibly telltale of ipcc Climate Science being more of a Propaganda Operation instead. Because there is no chance to confirm, replicate, or rebut the ipcc’s conclusions by examining its own science. Instead its conclusions can be propagandized at will to the public, and they were.
[A press release published before the SPM4 even started the PR propagandizing process earlier by promising a “smoking gun” to be forthcoming proving CO2=CAGW, but which was eventually never presented.]
John, you have no idea what you are talking about, or as to who you are talking to here at WUWT. You need to rid yourself of your own Fantasyland constructions and preconceptions, including the notion that ipcc CO2=CAGW Climate Science is real science, when the truth is that it is really only a gigantic “perception is reality” – thus intentionally deluding and delusional – Propaganda Operation.
Why do you insist upon being so far behind the curve that you are not even on the plot?
@Sun Spot
Why would anyone ask the idiot Jimmy Carter anything? He also claims to be a Christian. Yet, he enthusiastically supports a progressive movement hell bent destroying Christianity and enslaving humanity which seems to have settled on AGW as the means.
I really hate that Carter got the satisfaction, in his lifetime, of being relieved of being the worst president in our country’s history. Thanks for nothing B. Hussein Obama.
@John B
You ask why sceptics rarely do science. I’ll glide over the fact that scepticism is a prerequisite for science and just say that science is observing, hypothesising and testing. That third item is vital; while peer review is fallible, pal review is worse than useless. In getting hold of data, replicating results, and challenging analyses, the sceptics ARE doing science. That the climate scientists do their best to thwart these efforts serves science how, exactly?
There are also political AGW sceptics who, like political AGW believers, don’t contribute to the science. No doubt, some on both sides have come to their opinions after reviewing some of the evidence. Many have probably followed herd instincts. If you are bemoaning political sceptics, you should bemoan the political believers too.
I don’t know how you’ve convinced yourself that the IPCC isn’t mired in these same politics.
John B says:
May 27, 2011 at 4:33 pm
“That sounds to me rather like a creationist saying “evolution isn’t real science”. Creationists say that because evolution offends their religious views. It seems to me that skeptics deny (yes, deny) the science because it offends their ideological views.”
In science the burden of proof goes in one direction and it is opposite the direction presented by you. Scientists who put forth hypotheses have a duty as scientists to supply all other scientists with all data, mathematical methods, lab procedures and whatever is needed for all other scientists to replicate the experiments or observations that rendered the hypotheses reasonably well confirmed. To fail to do so is rock solid evidence that you are not a scientist. Ergo, no Climategater is a scientist and Lord Nurse has acknowledged the same by requesting that Climategaters receive government waivers from FOIA requests.
They’ve got the wrong type of “Judgment Day” in mind. To really get into this in a realistic way, one needs to explore Norse mythology, and the concept of cyclical history. There may be some basis for the lore. Perhaps a verbal history handed down amongst specific bands of Indo-Europeans who had found a niche at the edge of the Continental Ice, during the Pleistocene. The experience of the Younger Dryas would have made proto-scientists realize that the ice could advance rapidly, that the good times never last. Someday it will come back, the end of all good things (at least for the following 100K years). Ragnarok. On that note:
=====================================================
FOR THE REST OF NEXT WEEK…AN UNUSUALLY STRONG UPPER LEVEL LOW
(HEIGHTS 3.5 STANDARD DEVIATIONS BELOW NORMAL FOR THIS TIME OF
YEAR) WILL MOVE JUST OFF THE NORCAL COAST TUESDAY AND REMAIN
NEARLY STATIONARY INTO THURSDAY. ALTHOUGH THE VAST MAJORITY OF RAIN WILL BE TO OUR NORTH AND EAST…THE SOUTHERN EXTENT OF THE RAIN WEDNESDAY COULD REACH THE NORTH BAY. AFTER THAT LOW EJECTS OFF TO THE NORTHEAST AS ANOTHER DROPS DOWN BY NEXT FRIDAY WHILE A STRONG RIDGE BUILDS ACROSS THE CENTRAL US. BOTTOM LINE…OUR COOLER THAN NORMAL WEATHER IS EXPECTED TO CONTINUE THROUGH AT LEAST ALL OF NEXT WEEK AND LIKELY EVEN FURTHER OUT.
Let’s not forget my favorite doomsayer, Dr. Paul Erlich, who, it is said, has infallibly predicted 10 of the last zero apocalyptic events.
SteveSadlov says:
May 27, 2011 at 8:55 pm
per the forecast: How’s about a NORCAL year without a summer?
John B says:
May 27, 2011 at 4:33 pm
Show me where the science relayed by IPCC (for that is all the IPCC does) is not real science….
Well, first things first, John: if, as you claim, the ipcc is in effect only a Publisher and does not warrant its own product as real, including “peer reviewed”, science, then someone better let the EPA know pronto, i.e., that it can’t use the ipcc’s AR4 as a basis upon which to make its endangerment finding and then regulate CO2! Because that’s the basis upon which the EPA in turn accepted the ipcc’s product to begin with, that is, that the ipcc product was warranted by the ipcc to use only peer reviewed science. [Which it, nevertheless, didn’t do anyway, a fact itself which has also been repeatedly demonstrated.]
But no, John, the ipcc is not merely “relaying” science. It is actually alleging to practice CO2=CAGW Climate Science.
Therefore, as one important specific example of the unscientific nature of the ipcc’s Climate Science as practiced, it turns out that the ipcc’s CO2=CAGW Climate Science simply will not allow its hypotheses to be disproven or even seriously challenged by accumulating empirical evidence. Whereas, in contrast, this feature of its possible falsification is necessary to considering an hypothesis as “scientific”.
For example, its own critical “hot spot” which it predicted for the Tropical Troposphere as CO2’s fingerprint simply did not develop, which actually should have dispoven its CO2=[C]AGW hypothesis according to its own statements. But the ipcc would not allow this empirical disproof or even take the data as a significant challenge to its hypothesis. Instead it only claims to be looking for the “right” data, or possibly trying to manufacture it from the existing data, probably even as we speak.
Another example: rising CO2 levels have effectively decoupled from an essentially zero-sloped GMT at best, which, along with energy balance data, has led Kevin Trenberth to lament the conflict between the data and ipcc Climate Science’s own hypothesis-based prediction as a “travesty”; but, again, one quite tellingly not involving ipcc Climate Science’s own hypothesis as to CO2=[C]AGW; and instead again only relating to an alleged inadequacy in the data collection processes, one allegedly involving “lost heat” in the deep Oceans – but a suggestion for which there is a clear lack of suggestive data according to the Argo Buoys.
In other words, since ipcc Climate Science will not allow its CO2=CAGW hypotheses to be disproven, and essentially will not state any empirical condition which would disprove its hypotheses, its CO2=CAGW statements are functionally consistent with everything that might happen empirically; and therefore ipcc Climate Science actually has no scientific hypotheses whatsoever.
In effect, according to its own “methods” and practice, the ipcc Climate Science process truly has no affirmative scientific statements/hypotheses to make to begin with.
For the weak willed, weak minded and greedily opportunistic it is always easier to go with the flow rather than swim against a riptide of absurdity.