Global Warming and Ockham's Razor

In the Fourteenth Century, a Franciscan friar named William of Ochkam proposed a new way of looking at the world. Known today as "Ockham's Razor," his approach tried to cut through the complexities and convolutions of the Scholastic school of philosophy by suggesting that all else being equal, the simplest explanation for a phenomenon is probably the correct one.Like many other dangerous thinkers of the Renaissance--including such impious malcontents as Galileo and Copernicus--William of Ockham was ultimately charged with heresy. This fate is all too familiar to anyone who has tried bringing logic to bear upon arguments that are being waged emotionally. And, unfortunately, charges of heresy are not mere relics of history. We see similar charges made today against many whose only crime is being on the wrong side of a political debate--some of which are questions that, like the conception of the Universe in earlier days, are questions of science rather than matters of faith.Our Place in the Universe: The Renaissance Confronts CopernicusIn the days of Copernicus, conventional wisdom placed the Earth at the center of the Universe (since God would never place us anywhere else), since every object in the heavens moved around us in the sky. Global Warming Is It Real? It seems as if every time you turn on the television, listen to the radio or read newspapers and magazines, there is someone telling you about global warming. Stopping Global Warming Global Warming is a word that you will come across on any news channel or newspaper or magazine these days. Global warming simply means the presence of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere Canada Goose 7950M beyond the permissible limits. CIA And The Global Warming Issue It seems that Democrats are coming close to achieving the goal to categorize global warming transformation as a "national security" concern. Democrats are making effort to include language in current year?s Intelligence Authorization bill. It would allow intelligence agencies to devote a piece of their resources to learn the "threat" to "national security" from climate change or global warming. Global Warming Explained Global warming is thought of as one of the biggest threats to world security in modern times, and it is arguably already taking its toll in our weather system. By a combination of natural cyclical progression, and the impact of human behaviour and activity over the last century, the Earth is steadily seeing the effects of the global warming phenomenon. But what exactly is global warming, and exactly what impact could it have on our environment?But astronomers could tell that the paths taken by the planets seemed to move in uneven patterns across the sky--some, weaving their way through the night sky, while others occasionally crossed their own pathways while performing slow-motion loops. In the days before satellites and advanced rocket science, this offered two alternative explanations to the people of the Renaissance:Alternative A (favored by Copernicus and Galileo): If the Sun is in the center--and all the planets rotate around the Sun, rather than the Earth--then everything lines up, and the planets' motions are explained.Alternative B: If the Earth is in the center of the Universe, then for some reason not mentioned in the Bible, the planets are whirling in circles as they move around the Earth.The conclusion suggested by Ockham's Razor is that either the Sun is in the middle, or something is missing from the puzzle that we don't understand.The conclusion of the Church--the political Orthodoxy of the day--was that since we were obviously the center of Creation, the subject was not open to debate and the astronomers were obviously heretics for suggesting otherwise.From our perch in the 21st Century, we scoff at the early Church for its pronouncements, and salute Galileo and Copernicus for their vision and dedication to scientific truth. But we don't have to look far to see that while we are more scientifically advanced than our Renaissance ancestors, we haven't learned much from their experience. For proof, we only need to look at one of today's hottest issues--the heat generated by our concerns over global warning.