Bryan is promoting ...

... rational discussion: Science and Belief.

I completely agree with this, except when it comes to deciding to back what is claimed ot be the consensus. Had I done that in the Galileo case, I would have opposed Galileo, because the consensus among astronmers at the time favored the Tychonic System devised by Tycho Brahe, the leading astronomer of his day. Tycho and the consensus proved to be wrong, however. Which is why I thought Josie Appleton's Spiked piece ( Measuring the political temperature), which I linked to yesterday, was so worthwhile. We laypeople can get a handle on the historical context of the debate, I think.

An afterthought: I think I should elaborate somewhat on the concluding point I made in the comment I posted on Bryan's blog. The unstated presumption in much climate debate seems to be that, thanks to computer models, we can now make accurate predictions regarding the future state of the single most complex system we study, i.e., the biosphere. This strikes me, prima facie, as nonsense. The purpose of science is not to predict the future, which cannot, in fact, be predicted. Who's going to win tonight's Phillies game? It's anybody's guess, and nobody knows for sure. Period. And it beats me why more scientists are not concerned about having science returning to its astrological and alchemical roots.