Ever wonder why science and
scientists are taking such a beating in the public opinion
department these days? Then consider the American Association of
Petroleum Geologists.
Their recent decision to praise
pulp novelist Michael Crichton as “journalist of the year” feeds
not only cynicism about the oil and gas industry, but also drains
public faith in science itself.
We Americans are a
skeptical lot, who tend to believe humans — and even more so,
human institutions — are not to be trusted. I remember, as a
local reporter, covering a debate over a developer who wanted to
fill local wetlands. Someone pointed to the scientifically
demonstrated fact that filling in wetlands tends to contribute to
increased flooding. The facts were dismissed with the wave of a
hand: “You pay a scientist what he wants, and he will tell you what
you want.” The geologists’ association is feeding the same
cynicism, only on a global scale.
Crichton produces fat
thrillers like Jurassic Parkand The
Andromeda Strain. He won the “Journalist of 2006” award
from the oil geologists for his latest novel, State of
Fear. Every year, the association honors someone “for
notable journalistic achievement in communications contributing to
public understanding of geology.”
In all his work
Crichton uses the standard science fiction method of finding some
tiny kernel of truth, then blowing it up into fantasy. (This is the
literary method that provided the “dilithium crystals” that fuel
Star Trek’s USS Enterprise and
“endoplasmic slime” that globed Bill Murray in Ghost
Busters.) The end result is something that sounds
somewhat convincing, but is just pure hokum. There’s nothing
wrong with it — in the field of fiction.
Crichton’s method goes on to decorate his pages with
official-looking footnotes, with all the stylistic precision of a
high-school valedictorian. They’re impressive, as long as you
know nothing about the sources he cites. If you do, they tend to
disintegrate.
The thing to remember about Crichton is he
is a novelist — a writer of fiction — and not a
particularly profound one at that. His novels are beach reading
that can be enjoyed either with a Mai Tai buzz or to take
one’s thoughts off the hangover.
State of
Fear is a similar lightweight thriller. The plot
surrounds evil environmentalists who peddle hype about global
warming to make money. This would be fine if Crichton were just
hawking thrillers. But no. He wants to be taken seriously as a
social critic. His subtext is an attempt to debunk a large and
growing body of research that shows, all too clearly, that carbon
we pump into our atmosphere is warming our temperatures. Of course,
a source of that carbon is the petroleum we pay petroleum
geologists hefty sums to extract from the ground.
In some
circles, evidently, Crichton’s pseudo-science is taken
seriously. He was invited to the Oval Office to discuss his novel
with President Bush. I don’t care much about Crichton, but I
do care about science. Given all that the Enlightenment has given
America, we are flirting dangerously with abandoning science.
Educators and business leaders know that good scientific
understanding and a sound scientific infrastructure are what made
America the economic powerhouse of the 20th Century. They know that
science has saved us from the horrors of famine and disease. And
they look with alarm as schools from kindergarten to graduate
programs shy away from even the most basic science.
And
no wonder Americans are cynical about science, after hearing from
one “health expert” after another under the pay of the tobacco
industry tell Americans that smoking won’t hurt them, or at
least the evidence is “inconclusive.”
The petroleum
geologists have benefited greatly from American science, and they
have a stake in making sure people understand and support science.
This was reflected in the past selections of their annual
journalism award. Past winners include scientists who write
wonderfully well: Montana paleontologist Jack Horner and the late
Harvard professor Stephen J. Gould. Others winners are working
journalists, like my personal hero, John McPhee, who can make
complex geology not only understandable but also enjoyable. Winners
have not always been famous. Montana’s humble Mountain Press,
which produces those handy roadside geology guides, has also been
honored. There are novelists on the list, such as the late James
Michener, who was widely respected for the painstaking research he
poured into his encyclopedic novels.
But saying
State of Fear is somehow journalism that
advances science is like saying the movie Animal
House is journalism that advances higher education. But
then, Animal House never pretended to be
anything but a good laugh.
Ben Long is a
contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High
Country News (hcn.org). He is a writer in Kalispell,
Montana.
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