Many things in life are uncertain (apart from death and taxes obviously). And many things are uncertain in science. Indeed identifying, controlling and quantifying uncertainty is a key aspect of the practice of science. We’re so keenly aware of uncertainty that we try to dissuade students of talking about science “proving” things, as though in any given situation absolutely all uncertainty can be removed. We don’t think that it can be, and we can therefore never be “certain”. What we seek to do is accumulate evidence supporting a particular explanation for a given phenomenon so that it moves from being highly provisional (a hypothesis), to being fairly probably the correct explanation (a supported hypothesis), to being the best and most highly supported explanation we have (at which point it’s usually elevated to the status of a theory). This takes time and effort. Even so, we also accept that the most accepted theory, with apparently lots of supporting evidence, can always be superseded by a new theory. This might be an extension of the original theory, or indeed a contradiction of it. But this whole approach raises problems. It is tricky to explain (as you may have noticed), and it’s not the way most people think or speak most of the time. These problems (and why they matter) have been amply exposed by the pandemic.
Let’s
start with the language problem. There are situations where certainty is
conflated with clarity. In a startling reversal of form for the particular
bunch of politicians currently running the UK, the pandemic mantra has been
“We’re following the science, therefore….”. This is a reversal because it
suited them in a previous situation (ie the Brexit debate), to downplay the
view of “experts”. But as I’ve noted before, in the pandemic, this has changed.
Experts are in; but uncertainty is not out.
Politicians
and the media, are very keen on what they call clarity. But COVID19 is a virus new
to humans, and therefore new to science.
Nothing was known, indeed could be known, about it (although things could be
inferred). Early in the pandemic, at the time when many key decisions were
being taken, the science was more than usually uncertain, and therefore the
scientific advice to politicians had to be highly caveated (this is an
assumption on my part, I wasn’t privy to it). But this doesn’t make for snappy
press conferences. And it almost certainly guaranteed that the advice would
change, and therefore the instructions issued by politicians would have to
change (example: face masks). The media don’t particularly help in such
situations. Their stock in trade is the language of u-turn and climb-down. It
might have been wise to clearly communicate from the start that the course of
action being embarked upon was based on a consensus of what, given the evidence
at the time, was reasonable. Not certain, but reasonable. Problem is, would any
of us reacted as we need to if the politicians had spoken this way?
To be fair
to them, there have been some sceptics and deniers who have been happy to jump
up and down and accuse them of exaggerating the danger of the situation for
nefarious political ends. They have pointed out that for all the talk of half a
million UK dead and the NHS overwhelmed, this was not the disaster that
developed. But this is to miss the point. The one experiment that could not be
done was the one that involved doing nothing and essentially letting COVID19
run its course. So on the basis of (suitably caveated) advice, we had our
lockdown. And while we can’t be certain (that is, after all, the point I’m making),
the difference in case and death curves (eg see here) between most EU countries
(including the UK) and others like the US and Brazil, suggests that this was indeed
a sensible course of action. As an aside, we have to now hope that we don’t
blow it, and revert to the earlier trajectory that could lead to disaster. However,
at least some of the critics seem to suggest that with all the uncertainty
involved, essentially nothing should have been done. Action should only have
been taken once all doubt had been removed. But then that would have meant nothing
would have been done. And many thousands more would have died, deaths that we have
almost certainly avoided. It will perhaps be possible to demonstrate this
statistically, once more evidence has
accumulated. But at the point the big political and economic decisions had to
be taken, actual evidence was scarce.
We have heard
this sort of call to wait for certainty before, both in another contemporary context
and historically. And it’s here that the language problem, and the complexity
problem intersect. Climate change, its cause, effects and what we should do
about it (if we can do anything about it), is undoubtedly complex. The idea
that it is caused by human activity (primarily the burning of fossil fuels from
the industrial revolution on, increasing atmospheric CO2) has been a
matter of overwhelming scientific consensus for decades ie we’ve gone beyond hypothesis,
supported hypothesis, and theory to consensus. Even still, scientists in this
area will probably be unwilling to say they have no doubts, that the relevant theory/theories
have been “proved” in some absolute sense. That’s just not the appropriate
language of science. But that allows others to come along and say that the
science is uncertain, there are alternative explanations or the whole thing is
just a hoax. Here, a legal analogy might help.
I served
on a murder jury some years ago. We were faced with the weighty decision of
whether the prosecution had proved its case beyond reasonable doubt. Notice that
you can still convict and have doubt. The question is whether the case is
proved beyond reasonable doubt. One can always come up with lots of “could
be’s” and “might have beens”. But if they fly in the face of the evidence, or
are not supported by evidence, then they are not reasonable. And if they are not
reasonable, they is no reason to pronounce the defendant “not guilty”. If the scientific
consensus around climate change were a defendant in the dock, although there
are doubts and uncertainties, they would be ruled out by the evidence as unreasonable,
a guilty verdict handed down, and the jury would go away and sleep soundly,
their duty done. And yet the uncertainty, complexity, and the language of
science conspire to provide a space for those who say we should do nothing because
we are not 100% certain, precisely at the time when action has to be taken.
At least
some who operate in this space are following in a fairly inglorious tradition
that has been exposed several times. They seek to foment doubt and increase
complexity, obfuscate evidence and exacerbate uncertainty. They explicitly seek
to sow doubt, of the unreasonable sort. The approach was famously summarised by
a cigarette company executive in the 1960’s in a now infamous memo which stated
“Doubt is our product since it is the best means of competing with the ‘body of
fact’ that exists in the mind of the general public.”(1). What followed was essentially
a well funded disinformation campaign of epic proportions. Meanwhile,
cigarettes continued to be manufactured, sold and consumed and contributed to
the early deaths of millions. The story of this and similar campaigns is
expertly revealed in its gory detail by David Michaels in his books (2,3). And
there’s evidence that there are commercial and other interests playing the same
game with climate change. Stir up doubt, exacerbate the uncertainty, and the
public will conclude that either the issues are so complicated and unclear that
it would be premature to take action (like ban smoking or increase tax on gas
guzzlers), or that the inconvenience of action is not worth uncertain benefits.
This kind of thing is happening in the pandemic. Reasonable people are not taking reasonable actions because, particularly in the US, misinformation is being spread and uncertainty is being exacerbated. The scary bit is that when the much hoped-for vaccine becomes available, we all know it’s likely to start over vaccination against COVID19. But, to resort to some unscientific language, you can be sure that wearing a mask and washing your hands frequently at the moment, and getting vaccinated once one or more vaccines have passed through the requisite trials, is a really good idea. I don’t doubt it.
