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|  |  | | (This debate is closed and is a read-only archive) | | Science-based politics is an oxymoron
[11-Jan-2002]
| I have come in for a fair amount of stick for occupying the sceptical wing on the science of climate change while supporting political attempts to move away from fossil fuels ('soft-headed', 'misguided', 'superstitious' - see Richard Courtney, 19 December; Ken Henrick, 7 January).
| I don't see a contradiction. The first is a science issue and the stronger your background in that department the more authoritative your views (on average). But politics and policy-making aren't like that. Science-based politics is an oxymoron. Real life and real actions take place in an arena full of feedbacks that subvert good intentions. The best we can hope for is a grain of physics and a smaller grain of economics to point us approximately in the right direction plus a dose of common sense, within the obvious constraints of what is achievable.
| So I regret this polarisation around the position that whether to implement Kyoto or not must stand or fall 100 percent on the merits of the science. To my mind, policies that encourage lower-waste energy sources and reuse of 'mined' resources through recycling can rest on the idea of adding less entropy for its smidgen of physics underpinning, are politically and economically achievable thanks to nuclear and other non-fossil energy sources, but mostly fall in the realm of common sense.
| Max Beran, UK
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