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276 Environmental Ethics: Ambiguities Concerning What Is at Stake Orthodox Christianity can tell us about how to go to heaven but not how the heavens go. The Church does not possess special sensible, empirical, scientific knowledge (although this can be the case in the instance of great ascetics, true theologians) that can inform us about whether and how much global warming can be attributed to the presence of humans, what the implications of those changes are, what specifically should be done to ameliorate adverse changes, or about a host of other sensible-empirical issues that bear on particular policy choices regarding the environment. The Church does not serve as a general source of sensible-empirical knowledge that can guide policy choices through criticizing empirical scientific claims. Nor does the Church have knowledge about how prudently to weigh competing policy options, insofar as these are embedded in different empirical data sets. The Church, however, can join scientists, philosophers of science, and wise policymakers in reminding us about the uncertainty of scientific claims and about the need always to act with prudence and caution. In environmental policy, as with all empirically driven policy choices, there are good grounds for caution with regard to apodictic statements. The role of the Church is to bring us in right worship and right belief through repentance so that we may be purified, illumined by God, and brought into union with Him. Concerning the environment, and more generally with respect to developing environmental policy, there is uncertainty about all the empirical data that can be invoked to change and frame policy. One might note the extent to which many earlier policy recommendations failed to anticipate the curEcology , Morality, and the Challenges of the Twenty-First Century: The Earth in the Hands of the Sons of Noah H. Tristram Engelhardt Jr. C H A L L E N G E S O F T H E T W E N T Y  F I R S T C E N T U RY 277 rent downward trend in population growth throughout the world. Previous secular prophets of the future have at best had a mixed record. This point is multivalent. The uncertainty regarding predictions with respect to the environment reflects not only the uncertainty of all sensible empirical claims but also the special complexity of environmental studies and their attempts to predict the future. Environmental studies must take account, for example, of a wide range of variables, including fluctuations in the amount of energy emitted by the sun. On the face of the complexities and uncertainties involved , one would expect that precise predictions would generally be difficult , if not impossible. The articulation of a concrete environmental ethics must begin with a recognition of the finitude of human sensible empirical knowledge. Given that all policy recommendations are also shaped by background moral and political commitments, it must also be recognized that policy recommendations depend on the framing of the moral, cultural, and political presuppositions, and on the special agenda of those who commission studies and reports as well as oversee their production and interpretation. The overlay of moral and policy agendas in the framings of scientific findings in the case of reflections on matters ecological is illustrated by what has come to be termed “Climategate,” which shaped disputes regarding the possible influence of the agendas of particular scientists and research groups involved in the reporting of findings regarding the environment. When science is tied to a commitment to particular policy objectives, there is a tendency to accept findings as facts that will support one’s position regarding the nature of environmental change and thus regarding what counts as prudent environmental public policy. Empirical disagreements are often framed within disparate views of appropriate environmental policy. Reflections regarding the likely future of the environment are nested in controversy. Nevertheless, defenders of particular positions in scientific and policy debates often fail to nest their findings within sufficiently qualifying, cautionary statements. It is in response to the lack of such caution on the part of Albert Gore’s statements that his co–Nobel Laureate John Christy remarked that nature “is so complex, and so the uncertainties are great, and then to hear someone [Gore] speak with such certainty and such confidence about what the climate is going to do is—well, I suppose I could be kind and say, it’s annoying to me.” Scientists, especially applied scientists...

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