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Erick Brown and his pet goat Deer stand on the top a van parked on the Burlington Northern Railroad tracks at Farm to Market Road in Skagit County, Wash., May 13. Hundreds of people in kayaks and on foot gathered at the site of two oil refineries in Washington state to call for action on climate change and a fair transition away from fossil fuels.
((Scott Terrell/Skagit Valley Herald via AP)
By Gordon Fulks
WARNING: This article -- and by extension this newspaper -- should not be shown to children in the Portland Public Schools (PPS) system by order of the Portland School Board.
"Banned in Portland" may not yet have the same notoriety as "Banned in Boston" or "Banned in Tennessee." But we are catching up. Please do not look for a centerfold in this newspaper showing some gorgeous gal, au natural. And don't look for photos of Oregon politicians guilty of inappropriate sex. This isn't about sex. This is about something far more controversial: science.
Yes, believe it or not, competent science is again deemed a threat to humanity by daring to doubt the global warming paradigm. It is as though we are back in 1925 Tennessee, where fundamentalist followers of an old time religion were up in arms about evolution replacing creationism.
Today the issue is competent science versus catastrophism.
Competent science is that messy business where perpetually skeptical scientists argue the vital details of a very complex subject, in this case the Earth's climate.
Catastrophism is the pretend science of the Prophet Gore and his fanatical followers. It is far simpler. Whatever the question, the answer is that diabolical gas, carbon dioxide. It comes from burning fossil fuels, but not from breathing! It has ruined our climate.
But wait, there is still time to save the planet, if we vote for Democrats, enact carbon taxes and ban troublesome scientists who stubbornly maintain that "it's not true."
Mainstream religions have long since made peace with science, recognizing that these two human pursuits can coexist to great mutual benefit, as long as one does not pretend to be the other. Some who study the history of science recognize that religion has been vital to science by teaching the value and necessity of telling the truth. The fervent pursuit of the whole truth (not just a political or religious truth) led the Puritans of the 17th century to form the first scientific society, the British Royal Society, with the motto "Take no one's word for it."
Thus began 400 years of magnificent scientific progress, greatly assisted centuries later by Jews looking for an escape from the ghettos of Europe. From Albert Einstein to Richard Feynman, most of the great physicists of the 20th century were Jewish. Among Feynman's famous lectures was one calling for "utter honesty," a concept now largely forgotten in a scientific world dominated by presidential policy statements, vast amounts of cash and careerism.
The new "green religion" of Al Gore sadly demands only belief, not competence, good behavior or honesty. Gore's followers try to silence heretics.
That silencing has been going on for a long time in Oregon. Former Gov. Ted Kulongoski forced Oregon's best state climatologist, George Taylor, to retire and replaced him with one of the faithful. Scientists with advanced degrees are excluded from our schools in favor of Gore disciples like former Oregon Secretary of State Bill Bradbury, who lacks even the college education required for teachers but still lectures on global warming.
What will Portland children miss with all this political interference? They will miss science entirely -- not just climate science. Propagandized children never learn that science is much more than a good story told by their elders. They will never learn that science is completely determined by logic and evidence, not by the "authority" and "consensus" preached by "Warmers." They will miss the wisdom of our greatest scientists.
Albert Einstein's famous words -- "One man can prove me wrong" -- are surely blasphemous. That is dangerous doubt in a postmodern world. Today, it takes a political earthquake to topple politically correct pseudoscience. Students may even miss reading the voluminous United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports that are the foundation of the climate scam. They dare to express the doubt now banned in Portland.
We are back to 1925, with the modern version of creationism winning once again over science. Pitiful.
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Gordon Fulks lives in Corbett and can be reached at gordonfulks@hotmail.com. He holds a doctorate in physics from the University of Chicago's Laboratory for Astrophysics and Space Research.