May 12, 2006
5/12 - Environmental Disinformation: Does anyone really care?
This is sort of what "shifting baselines," is about. If we don't have any firm hold on what the baselines once were, then the door is wide open for disinformation campaigns. Like this one sponsored by something called the Pacific Research Institute, in San Francisco, which is yet another right wing think tank providing leadership in areas that the left wing neglects.
In this case they are happily out there sending out the message that all is well in the environment, and doing so with actual data from studies of nature. But so much of what they offer up are case studies in shifted baselines -- for example they cite a recent study of spawning stock in Chesapeake blue crabs showing a 25% increase in abundance from 2003 to 2004.
What they use to their advantage is the idea that if you don't have massive and thorough data on the decline of a species, you should go with the assumption that there's nothing wrong. Bottom line, all else equal, let's err in the direction of "no worries, mate."
It's a shame the environmental movement first off doesn't have the resources to combat these sorts of disinformation programs, and secondly, that they don't seem to understand the importance and potential impact of disinformation enough to want to address it. The perfect example of this was Michael Crichton's novel, "State of Fear," which was just chuckled at by the largest environmental group combatting global warming.
Fighting for environmental "truth" so we can all relax
Posted by Randy Olson at May 12, 2006 08:05 AM