“He that can make the philosopher’s stone, will certainly be rich.”— Ben Jonson, The Alchemist
Victor Lustig understood a profound truth about human nature. When he famously “sold” the Eiffel Tower for scrap metal in 1925, he did not prey upon fools. Fools rarely possess sufficient capital to interest a first-rate confidence man. Lustig sought intelligent, successful businessmen and persuaded them that they possessed privileged information unavailable to ordinary mortals. Official documents were produced. Deadlines were imposed. Secrecy was encouraged. The improbable acquired the appearance of inevitability.
The genius of the confidence game lies in its appeal to vanity as much as greed. The victim wishes to believe that he knows what others do not. Recent developments in climate science invite reflection upon this curious feature of human affairs.
One of the more severe climate scenarios employed for years in scientific and policy discussions, known as RCP 8.5, has increasingly come under reconsideration as an unlikely “business as usual” pathway. Scientists regard this as a natural consequence of improved knowledge and changing assumptions. Fair enough. Science should revise itself as evidence accumulates.
Yet the ordinary citizen might be forgiven for asking an awkward question. If yesterday’s alarming certainty becomes today’s revision, how should society think about tomorrow’s predictions? That question should not offend anyone. It lies at the very heart of scientific inquiry.
The significance of this revision extends beyond climate science itself. For years, the RCP 8.5 scenario served as the foundation for countless alarming headlines, policy proposals, academic studies, and public warnings. Citizens were frequently told that dramatic social and economic changes were necessary to avert a future described in increasingly catastrophic terms. Scientists naturally refine their models as knowledge improves; that is how science advances. The more interesting question concerns the confidence with which speculative projections were often presented to the public. If assumptions now regarded as increasingly implausible once formed the basis of urgent political demands, then the public is entitled to ask how certainty was manufactured from what were, in reality, contingent forecasts. News organizations frequently reported the most dramatic projections while devoting far less attention to the assumptions upon which those projections depended.
Ben Jonson would have appreciated the irony. His alchemist promised hidden knowledge and astonishing transformations to eager patrons. The philosopher’s stone would transmute base metals into gold and reveal the secrets of nature itself. Four centuries later, mankind remains fascinated by the prospect of converting uncertainty into certainty and complexity into calculation.
Modern science is one of civilization’s greatest achievements. It has lengthened lives, conquered disease, and transformed the material condition of mankind. Yet science is practiced by human beings, and human beings remain gloriously imperfect creatures.
Universities compete for funding. Governments establish research priorities. Laboratories seek grants. Young scholars naturally pursue fields likely to attract support and professional advancement. This observation should surprise no one. Every institution responds to incentives.
The scientific enterprise itself depends upon criticism. Thomas Kuhn observed that research communities often work within accepted paradigms that define important questions and productive lines of inquiry. Such paradigms are indispensable. Without them, organized knowledge would be impossible. Yet history suggests that consensus and certainty are not identical. Scientific revolutions have an inconvenient habit of arriving unexpectedly.
The climate debate illustrates both the strengths and the limitations of modern expertise. Climate models represent remarkable achievements of mathematics, computing, and observation. They attempt to describe a planetary system of extraordinary complexity involving oceans, clouds, atmospheric chemistry, biological processes, volcanic activity, solar influences, and countless interacting feedbacks.
A model, however sophisticated, remains a model. The distinction matters. Maps are useful precisely because they simplify reality. They become dangerous only when we forget that the map and the territory are not the same thing.
Scientific dissent also has a legitimate place in this discussion. Physicists Gerhard Gerlich and Ralf Tscheuschner published a controversial critique of aspects of prevailing greenhouse theory that generated substantial debate and criticism. Many scientists reject their conclusions. Others view their work as a useful challenge to accepted assumptions.
The larger principle is perhaps more important than the particulars: Science advances through scrutiny, arguments invite responses, and hypotheses deserve examination. A proposition should never become immune from criticism simply because it enjoys temporary popularity.
The philosopher David Hume offered an even deeper caution concerning prediction itself. Human beings expect the future to resemble the past because experience encourages that expectation. The sun has risen every morning of our lives. Seasons follow one another with comforting regularity. Experience creates confidence.
Yet Hume observed that confidence and logical certainty are different things. We may expect the sun to rise tomorrow; however, we do not possess a deductive proof that it must. Hume’s point was not that the sun will fail to appear. It was that humility should accompany prediction. That observation possesses surprising relevance in modern public life.
Long-range forecasting involves assumptions: Assumptions evolve, data improve, models change, and scientists revise conclusions. None of this constitutes failure; however, it represents the ordinary process of inquiry. Difficulties arise only when provisional judgments acquire the status of unquestionable truth and the public discussion surrounding climate occasionally exhibits this tendency.
Skepticism is sometimes treated as moral deficiency rather than intellectual curiosity. Questions become unwelcome and doubt becomes suspect. Yet, it is precisely skepticism that built modern science. Galileo questioned Aristotle; Newton questioned the ancients; Einstein questioned Newton. Progress emerged not from silence but from argument. History also counsels perspective.
The natural world has always possessed extraordinary power. Hurricanes, floods, droughts, and storms did not await modern industrial society before making their appearance. The Great Miami Hurricane of 1926 devastated South Florida long before climate change became a subject of international conferences. Nature has always been capable of astonishing violence.
This does not diminish contemporary environmental concerns; however, it reminds us that simple explanations for complex phenomena deserve careful examination. Hans Christian Andersen understood another aspect of the human condition. His Emperor paraded before his subjects wearing magnificent invisible garments that existed only in the imagination of those too intimidated to admit what they plainly saw. Victor Lustig and Ben Johnson, both understood it.
Perhaps modern societies also should remember their lessons. Authority deserves respect, but it does not deserve infallibility; experts deserve attention but do not deserve exemption from criticism; scientific institutions deserve support, but do not benefit from unquestioning reverence.
The distinction matters because democratic societies make decisions under conditions of uncertainty. Energy policy, agriculture, infrastructure, conservation, and technological innovation all involve judgments concerning risks and probabilities. Wise policy acknowledges both the value of expertise and the inevitability of imperfect knowledge.
The temptation to transform probability into prophecy should be resisted. David Hume’s old philosophical challenge remains surprisingly modern. Experience teaches. Observation informs, the evidence accumulates, and yet the future retains the right to surprise us. That is not an argument for ignorance. It is an argument for modesty.
Ben Jonson warned us about alchemists, Victor Lustig warned us about confidence men, Hans Christian Andersen warned us about emperors, and David Hume warned us about certainty itself. Their lessons converge upon a remarkably simple truth. Human beings possess an extraordinary capacity to mistake confidence for knowledge.
The truly scientific spirit may consist not in claiming perfect foresight, but in retaining the humility to revise conclusions when new evidence appears, the courage to entertain dissenting views, and the wisdom to distinguish between what we know, what we suspect, and what we merely hope.
The future, after all, has a stubborn habit of refusing to read our predictions or tea leaves.
