Al Franken Had to Explain the Scientific Method to Rick Perry

By Manola Secaira, Grist

26 June 17

Still Rickin', Still Rollin'

uring his Thursday testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee about his department’s 2018 budget request, Minnesota Senator Al Franken decided to take Energy Secretary Rick Perry to task for statements he made on Monday.

Perry claimed that most changes in climate are due to “naturally occurring events, the warming and the cooling of our ocean waters, and some other activities” rather than CO2. What?

“Don’t you think it’s okay to have this conversation about the science of climate change?” Perry said. “What’s wrong with being a skeptic about something … that’s going to have a massive impact on the American economy?”

Franken was quick to point out that Perry is describing our old friend “the scientific method,” the type of skeptical analysis that is “exactly how science works.” Scientists have exhaustively debated and examined the cause of increasing global temperatures and concluded that, yes, it’s man-made climate change. The warming oceans are the result of climate change, not a cause of it.

“There’s no peer-reviewed study that doesn’t say this is happening,” Franken said.