Announcing my Pollution Kills tour with Lady Gaga

The other night I was hanging out with my thirteen year old cousin when I remarked that Lady Gaga might not be that supremely great at singing, kinda looks mannish, and wears, let’s say, the most interesting costumes. Basically, my point was that I don’t get Lady Gaga and am perplexed by her popularity. So you can imagine my surprise when my cousin replied with something along the lines of: “omg, I know, everything she does is so kewl. Just everything. I don’t know how she does it.” At that point it became clear to me that the two of us would have a great deal of trouble discussing what is ‘cool’ because the word ‘cool’ has such vastly different meanings to each of us.

Why do I bring this up? Well, I had a very similar experience recently while reading Large Dead Lizards concerning the word science. Or should I type ‘science?’ I cheerfully started reading a recent post by one of the lizards with the title: The Sound of Settled Science which began with the line: The science on Global Warming is now, without a doubt, settled

Obviously, I knew I was in for some thoughtful, coherent and timely reading. But believe it or not, the ‘science’ they referred to supposedly demonstrated that climate change is not happening and, according to some commentators, lots of carbon in the atmosphere isn’t a long-term problem.

Like debating ‘cool’ with my cousin, I know I can’t constructively debate ‘science’ with this particular lizard (in fairness to my cousin, she does know cool better than me). Our definitions of the word are just too different. So I’m not going to try. The truth is, over the long haul, all science is wrong or, at least, still to be improved or refined -- in other words it is a work in progress. Who would have thought Newton could be wrong/incomplete -- but Einstein had something to say about the fundamental properties of the universe. And of course, no one understands quantum physics. 

Instead I’m going to pose a challenge to all those who doubt the climate is changing (and remember, Sarah Palin believes the climate is changing). Let’s agree that pollution harms human beings. So it’s bad to breathe polluted air and it’s bad to drink polluted water and it’s bad to touch polluted things. Therefore, we should have laws that reduce pollution. Surely, you’re still with me right lizard? In the past environmental laws have been very successful at reducing air and water pollution. I believe we even have laws restricting the level of lead in things in our homes. 

Now here is the challenge: Help pass environmental legislation that reduces pollution instead of just yelling “I don’t believe in climate change!” If you disagree with a particular ‘solution’/‘bill’ to this problem then propose another one that meets your standard of actually reducing pollution and improving human health. If you don’t do this you start to sound like all you really want to do is oppose any ‘liberal’ idea and I’ll start to get the impression that you don’t have any ideas of your own.

So... is pollution bad lizard? Can you acknowledge it’s harmful effects and propose some solutions?

p-p-p-p-pokerface! errr dammit! G-Unit!