Distortion, Exaggeration, and Cherry Picking

By Bob Difley
Distortion, exaggeration, and cherry picking by news sources, pundits, and bloggers are affecting how we (the generic “we”) think about global warming, rising fuel prices, and alternative energy sources according to physicist Richard A. Muller, whose book, Physics for Future Presidents: The Science Behind the Headlines is meant to look at these world wide problems from a physics perspective. Using a purely scientific approach, based on hard physics, he urges us to take an unbiased, unemotional look at the proven facts on these issues before making up our minds.
What we read or hear in the media or on the internet is at least somewhat biased by the reporter and his agenda, no matter how much he/she attempts to take a neutral—just the facts, ma’am—approach.
For example, you’ve probably seen the report that the cost of hurricane damage has been rising exponentially in the last 30 years as a result of global warming. Pretty strong proof when you see it on a chart. But wait a minute. If you dig a little deeper–according to Muller–you will find that the figures used are not adjusted for inflation. Not only that , it was not taken into consideration that there are now more people living along shorelines where hurricanes hit, and beach property has become very desirable, pushing property values to very high levels and therefore giving a distorted view of the actual physical damage and destructive power when cost of damage is the method of measurement.
This is an example of distortion that some use to prove the their theories, such as the existence of global warming. The problem with distortion, is that once the facts are straightened out, others use the original mis-use of those facts as proof that global warming doesn’t exist. That kind of thinking is just as wrong. Just because those facts turn out to be distorted, does not mean the problem is not real. Instead we need to look closely at the data, and not just accept it as “absolute truth” even when it supports our personal opinion.
You also hear that Category 4 and 5 hurricanes have increased greatly in the last quarter century. Again, Muller says it is more likely that the increase is caused by improved detection of tropical storms and hurricanes through the use of satellite images, not just from observations by ships at sea or counting them only when they hit land, the methods used in the past. When balancing out the data, for instance, counting only those storms that touch land (eliminating those out at sea that don’t come ashore and were possibly not detected before) you find that there is no obvious trend, either up or down. But these facts don’t necessarily prove that global warming doesn’t exist. It just means that you can’t use hurricane frequency and strength as proof.
There are many other areas, with stronger facts based on physics and science that indicate that climate change is taking place, without the necessity of exaggerating data to make the theory look more definitive.
Cherry picking is another device to watch out for. This is where someone trying to present his hypothesis offers only those points that support his position, conveniently ignoring those that don’t. This again does not mean that his position is not a good one, just that he chose only data that supported the position, rather than opening it up to further discussion and review by presenting all the data, possibly resulting in a revised hypothesis that could be closer to reality.
The true scientific method is valid because a credible scientist publishes his work–his hypotheses and theories–before his peers, who then try to either reproduce the same results or refute them with their own research. The beauty of this method is that you seldom hear a credible scientist declare anything with absolute certainty, because there is always that possibility, however slim, that some of the data could change or that other data may change his results.