Information Overload

We will never, and should never, stop man's never-ending quest for more knowledge and greater understanding -- but we should recognize that computer-aided science brings with it the chance that we'll know so much that we'll be paralyzed by our knowledge.

Case in point: Trees.

The common belief is that trees are good. They convert nasty greenhouse gases to yummy oxygen and help lower temps.

Trees are such good buddies to the planet that polluters can earn clean air credits by planing forests in urban areas.

But wait!

Now science is questioning whether trees are all that great. Stanford University atmospheric scientist Ken Caldeira told a science panel this month:

"Forests do store carbon, and as a result, the planet initially cools a little -- maybe tenths of degrees. But over the long term, trees' heat absorption warms things up more." Caldeira and colleagues at California's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory created a computer simulation [i.e. a piece of gusswork] showing that if most land areas in northern latitudes were covered with forests, the planet would be six degrees warmer than it is today.

The solution to this conundrum? More studies! More grants! More conferences! More computer models!

What we need is more common sense and less blind reliance on science. Science could break through into a new dimension of usefullness at any time, but today too many scientists are bogged down in overanalyzing minutia and is slowing progress, not advancing it.

The last people to realize this, of course, are the scientists themselves, and the people who fund them. We can't control the scientists, but we can control the money, and it's time to cut the funding of foolish science. h/t Greenie Watch