Tag Archives: christianity

Science and Religion

From an interview with John Cook, the creator of the Skeptical Science blog.

Q. What is your scientific background and/or interest or activity in the environmental arena?

A. I studied physics at university and majored in astrophysics in my post-grad honors year. After completing my studies, I went into real world (a sorely needed break from academia) and I’ve been working from home for just over a decade now. I’ve never been involved in environmentalism before. To be honest, I’m not sure I’d characterize myself as an environmentalist now. While I got into global warming out of scientific curiosity, my continued interest and all the hours I spend on it are more out of concern for humanity than nature. I’m a Christian and a strong aspect of my faith is social conscience – hating injustice and caring for the poor. As I pored through the research into global warming impacts, I learned that poor and developing countries are those worst affected by global warming. Ironically, these are the countries least able to adapt to climate change.

(It may help his sense of urgency that he is Australian, where almost the entire population lives within an hour’s drive of the coastline.)

Cook has also produced an iPhone app called Skeptical Science, which contains a list of arguments against standard anti-global-warming talking points.