Julia in the Sky with Diamonds

The cults misread the relationship between cause and effect. A necessary condition for the arrival of cargo was the presence of real airstrips, control towers, aeroplanes and so on. Cultists believed this was a sufficient condition. They repeated the same error on another level too, believing that imitation control towers and airstrips were just as functional as the real thing. Determining causation is clearly a tricky business.

Does the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis face a similar challenge? Is it compromised by flawed assumptions of causation? Is the presence of a certain trace amount of carbon dioxide necessary or sufficient to cause "dangerous" climate change? Will a price on Australia's carbon dioxide emissions be necessary or sufficient to prevent "climate disruption" here, especially if the other 98.5 per cent the world's carbon dioxide emitters take no action? Is an alarmist CCC – which has only one climate scientist who already advises the government - necessary or sufficient to provide sound independent advice on such fundamental issues?

Some experts like Gavin Schmidt,a leading climatologist from NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, maintain the Earth's climate is so irreducibly complex there will never be established laws of climate change. If so, how will the "ceremony" - spending billions on super-computer "control towers" and data collection "airstrips" - ensure delivery of the precious climate "cargo", namely genuine predictive power? Or will the day of performance verification be delayed continually by the modellers, as is the case with most prophetic ventures?

Before policy-makers proceed further with their mission of decarbonising the world, perhaps they should consider another question: Is there a difference between worshipping Prince Philip or John Frum on the Vanuatan island of Tanna in the hope of attracting cargo, and attributing oracular status to readings from the Books of Garnaut, Stern, Steffen, and other climate futurologists?

It is time to revisit the late Nobel laureate Richard Feynman's 1974 address at the Californian Institute of Technology. His views on Cargo Cult Science should be read by all involved with "tackling climate change" and "harnessing public dialogue."

"We really ought to look into theories that don't work and science that isn't science", Feynman said. The cargo cults did almost everything right. Their form was perfect, but the rituals didn't work. No aeroplanes landed. "So I call these things cargo cult science, because they follow all the apparent precepts and forms of scientific investigation, but they are missing something essential."

For Feynman, what was missing was: "a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty. For example, if you are doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid – not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results...

"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself – and you are the easiest person to fool. So you have to be very careful about that. After you've not fooled yourself, it's easy not to fool other scientists. You just have to be honest in a conventional way.

"We've learned from experience that the truth will come out. Other experimenters will repeat your experiment and find out whether you were wrong or right. Nature's phenomena will agree or disagree with your theory. And, although you may gain some temporary fame and excitement, you will not gain a good reputation as a scientist if you haven't tried to be very careful in this kind of work. It's this type of integrity, this kind of care not to fool yourself, that is missing to a large extent in much of the research in cargo cult science."

Furthermore "you should not fool the layman when you're talking as a scientist...I'm talking about a specific, extra type of integrity that is not lying, but bending over backwards to show how you are maybe wrong, that you ought to have when acting as a scientist. And this is our responsibility as scientists, certainly to other scientists, and I think to laymen.

"One example of the principle is this: if you've made up your mind to test a theory, or you want to explain some idea, you should always decide to publish it whichever way it comes out. If we only publish results of a certain kind, we can make the argument look good. We must publish both kinds of results. I say that's also important in giving certain types of government advice."

Feynman's wish

Feynman hoped his CalTech audience would have: "the good luck to be somewhere where you are free to maintain the kind of integrity I have described, and where you do not feel forced by a need to maintain your position in the organization, or financial support, and so on, to lose your integrity. May you have that freedom."

Melanesian cargo cultists built mock airports and performed pantomimes, but they failed to attract cargo. Cargo cult scientists claim "the science of climate change is settled." They build computer models with tricky assumptions and dummy variables, but they have yet to show genuine predictive power. Cargo cult politicians make inflated promises about delivering another "cargo" – the ability to manipulate Australia's climate by imposing a new tax – but are silent on this truth: the chaotic nature of climate change makes it a futile ambition. Cargo cultists from our business and financial sectors insist a legislated carbon price is required to deliver "certainty" – and trading profits.

Let us not fool ourselves, or be fooled by others. Stage-managed cabals, pre-determined outcomes, committee confidentiality and dodgy science are surely relics from another age, a darker space. Give us instead leaders – and scientists – of honesty and integrity; not rent seekers and dreamers high in the sky with diamonds.