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vern_humphrey
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I draw the line at attending Mass “sky clad.”
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Ender
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This is what I disagree with. The environmental questions you raise are not moral issues but prudential ones; tying them to the Church and the eucharist is an attempt to apropriate the Church’s moral clout to achieve a prudential (political) end.
The disagreements are not between those who want to protect the environment and those who would despoil the earth for financial gain but between those who believe certain specific actions will work and those who believe they either won’t work or are not worth the cost. Unless you are asserting that it is a sin to be mistaken about the outcome of particular policy then there is no role for the Church in any of these discussions - she deals with issues of faith and morals, not prudential opinions.
Ender
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fix
Guest
That is what I am hinting at here. Perhaps changing the way parishes obtain these items may cause more harm than good. I have no idea what impact would be on folks who drive or all the other people involved in the chain of events we are talking about.
But, mathematical formulas do not give us moral answers. This issue here would be one of formal versus material cooperation with evil. Perhaps someone can show me how these issues are more serious than remote material cooperation with evil? Even that is a stretch.
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fnr
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Believe it or not, I agree with you wholeheartedly! I don’t at all question the motives of anyone in celebrating the Eucharist (or question anything else for that matter).
I guess this is the basis of the debate here. For me, there is a non-zero probability that my actions, and I suppose those of other celebrants, are going to harm others. I base this belief on the scientific articles I cited above, showing, for instance, that fetal exposure to pesticides apparently increases the odds that a baby will be born underweight. Not a good thing in terms of long-term health. Sure, I can’t prove with certainty that there’s a harm, and neither can other prove with certainty that there isn’t, so there’s a gray area.
All I’m saying is that it’s worth the discussion. I can’t say whether the costs of switching to, for instance, organically grown wheat and grapes for the physical host and wine in Mass, would outweigh the benefits. It very well may not. But my problem is that nobody, to my knowledge, has ever really looked at it! I’m completely open to the “do nothing” option, but I’m trying to base it on the science that we have now, and leave decisions subject to revision as we have more information.
To me, avoiding the discussion when there’s an awareness of the information on potential impacts constitutes something, probably short of sin, that is unfortunate at best. If I am aware that something I’m doing may be harming someone else, even if I’m not sure of it, don’t I have some obligation to at least assess whether there is even the possibility of reducing that harm?
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fnr
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fnr
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How can something be “the land’s” fault? Soil arability is a function of its ability to maintain sufficient nutritional content to support life. Human activities can cause soil degradation. The balance of productive to degraded soil has been shifting toward degradation in recent years.
Here’s the US Geological Survey’s page on it.
Nothing is “the Eucharist’s fault,” but if humans raise the crops needed to produce bread and wine in a manner that harms the soil’s long-term viability, it’s Catholics that are the ones that can change it!
Grapes and wheat are produced in many areas using artificial pesticides. And whether they’re really “cleansed of impurities” is a good question. I know of one 2003 study that found that children who consumed organic diets had significantly lower levels of pesticides in their urine. From the abstract:*
“The dose estimates suggest that consumption of organic fruits, vegetables, and juice can reduce children’s exposure levels from above to below the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s current guidelines, thereby shifting exposures from a range of uncertain risk to a range of negligible risk.”*
I’d think that ensuring that the “accidents” of bread and wine are free from impurities would be a way of showing our respect.
That only takes place in communist economies. In market economies, consumers can demand that the goods the purchase meet their criteria.
Sadly, an asthmatic friend of mine has asthma attacks when the closest thing we have to “holy smoke” (incense) is used during Mass!
I hate to be a complete downer, but air pollution kills people, produces breathing problems, accelerates athersclerosis, and is just generally bad for you.
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Ender
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fnr
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I think we’ve reached agreement! To me, the moral choice comes from thinking about the problem, and keeping oneself open to different outcomes than one expects at the beginning (myself included). That, to me, is called integrity, and it reflects both humility and honesty.
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Yerusalyim
Guest
The peer review process is, perhaps, no more than an example of elitist inbreeding. The same folks who control the channels of the peer review process are the same one’s claiming global warming is man made…the ones who are getting all that money (billions) for researching MAN MADE global warming…shall I cite instances where scientists who submitted work denying that global warming was man made were rejected?
Oh, and when was MANN peer reviewed on his “hockey stick”?
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fnr
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Yes, please. I’d also like to see an analysis of publication bias in publication on specific topics, rather than a broad-brushed dismissal of a process that’s been accepted for hundreds of years.
The alternative, surveying every climatologist based on their opinion, uninformed or not, tends to put quacks’ opinions on the same footing as those who do legitimate research. That’s a highly anti-academic approach to research.
I’d also be intersted in seeing if anyone has developed a global circulation model that doesn’t predict future warming given rising CO2 emissions. From what I can tell, among the 18 or so global climate models currently in existence, they all suggest that the climate forcing potential of incremental CO2 concentration increases. Not that the models are all correct, but that when you assemble the whole of mechanistic information on climate, they tend to aggree.
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vern_humphrey
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The point of peer review is that the original author of the study must release his study design and data. This must be in sufficient detail so others can replicate the study.
Let’s take an example in another field – a historical researcher named Belisles wrote a book called “The Arming of America” which proported to show firearms were actually quite rare in earlier times. He received great applause - because he had disproved the “Gun Myth.”
He cited his sources – and other researchers found he had faked them! For example, he claimed he had researched wills from 19th Century San Francisco, and found very few guns being left to heirs. But someone else noticed that there are no 19th century wills from San Francisco – county records were all burned in the earthquake and fire of 1906.
So you can lie, twist, turn, and fake a study – and even be applauded by your peers if the study shows what they want it to show. But if you release your study design and data, sooner or later it will catch up with you.
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fnr
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I forgot to mention that I volunteer my time as a peer reviewer in two major journals that routinely publish climate-related articles. Your first allegation, that of “elitist inbreeding” I would characterize as false. First, I don’t have any of the “credentials” that would entitle me to a title of “elite.” I was invited to be a reviewer on the basis of my honest critique of my own work in public meetings. I should note that I, for one, have never rejected an article on the basis of its conclusion. I am loathe to reject an article, except for those that are so methodologically flawed or whose results are so sensitive to unprovable assumptions.
Secondly, I’m not getting ANY money for researching climate change, and my reviews of articles are a free donation of my personal time.
Don’t get me wrong. Institutional biases do creep into the process, but it’s more because journal editorial boards are sometimes excited to publish large, statistically significant, or “important” studies, than a systematic bias based on content. Fortunately, research organizations such as the Cochrane Collaborative help to promote the use of techniques that look for systematic evidence of publication bias and other problems in publishing.
I would characterize as more concerning the largely PR-driven anti-science movement trying to discredit everything from the sugar in food-diabetes connection to the general circulation models used in climatological forecasting. From what I can see, it’s a bumper-sticker driven thing, with a few well-funded speakers presenting results that they never bother to publish (or even try to publish), spin language (for instance saying that a “p-value” of 0.06 means “no association” without ever referring to statistical power), and sow rumors of a few good-hearted scientists just trying to get the truth out at large scientific meetings, only to be crushed by the close-minded elitists of academia. All very well to pull at the heartstrings of their funders/subscribers, but not what I would call a process dedicated to scientific integrity.
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Contarini
Guest
Why do you think this is silly? Why not walk when you can? What is heretical about walking? The early Franciscans and Dominicans walked everywhere–they weren’t even allowed to hitch a ride in a cart.
I agree that whipping oneself up into a frenzy of guilt is counter-productive, but the same is true of anything.
How about this argument: since we all die, what is wrong with abortion? The murdered children just go to heaven sooner. You can condone any grave evil with this kind of argument. It’s a radically amoral way of thinking.
I recognize that you say we should be prudent, but it’s about more than prudence. It’s about how we view creation–as a natural sacrament of God’s presence, or as a tool to be exploited for our own purposes. Embryonic stem cell research and the exploitation of the non-human creation are the same evil, and they must be fought together. Christians must not let themselves be distracted by the irrelevancies of partisan politics, which have divvied up moral issues into “right” and “left.”
Edwin
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Contarini
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Nice use of “perhaps” to try to fool us into overlooking what a completely obscurantist and irrational remark this is. In every other field of life, it is accepted that if you spent years learning how to do something, you can probably do it better than other people. Only academics are singled out for scorn. Only the mind, apparently, is incapable of acquiring skills.
Edwin
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vern_humphrey
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If someone can show scientifically that we should switch from wheat-based hosts to some other form and that would have a measurable impact on the environment, I’d be interested in seeing their arguments.
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fnr
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That’s quoting me quite out of context. Actually, I have no problem with people disagreeing with me. Feel free to ask, and I’ll tell you where all my biases and uncertainties are, and I’ll do my best to give you an honest answer. I take honesty and integrity in my work as a solemn moral obligation. I’ve routinely said in my work that I’d rather be fired than to give an answer that’s not supported by available evidence (which means ALL evidence I can find). I’ve been accused of trying to undermine my employers as a result!
What I do have a problem with is with the tactics used by some groups in attacking the scientific peer review process itself. The types of attacks made, such as an elitist cabal of politically-oriented scientists seeking to suppress the truth, are simply unanswerable, because they’re not based in fact. They’re based in rumor which can be neither proved nor disproved. In fact, the arguments are far too post-modern in orientation for my taste. Sounds like these groups are suddenly fans of Michel Foucault! At least the PR firms that helped to generate these strategies, such as Burston-Marstellar and Hill & Knowlton are well-familiar with these strategies.
Tell you what. Look at the Cochrane Collaborative’s page on publication bias, which I think you’d agree is an objective way of evaluating whether it’s occurring (unless of course, you agree with postmodernists that there is no objective truth). If you can demonstrate to me using this or similar methods that there is systematic publication bias, I’ll agree with you that there’s something deeply wrong with the scientific process. A good starting place is a funnel plot, which plots effect size vs. study precision (or sample size). If your plot’s not a funnel, you can start to ask why, for instance, the only positive studies that have been published are small. It’s not certain in this case that publication bias exists, but those cases warrant additional attention.
However, it takes more than unproven assertion of wrongdoing for me to buy it. “Steven Milloy says so” is hardly an argument. Please, bring all your tools!
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