Deniers set to change Queensland science curriculum with “post-normal science” nonsense.

They did it. The Queensland Liberal National Party state convention overwhelmingly passed a motion calling on the education minister to put an end to teaching of anything to do with climate change in schools. Here’s the Brisbane Times report:

Meanwhile, LNP members have overwhelmingly voted to ensure the removal of “environmental propaganda” about climate change from schools.

The motion, proposed by the LNP’s Noosa State Electorate Council, calls on Education Minister John-Paul Langbroek to require Queensland schools to “remove environmental propaganda material, in particular post-normal science about ‘climate change’, from the curriculum and as adjunct material at exam time”.

The mover of the motion, LNP member Richard Pearson, railed against “those false prophets who would poison the minds of our children in our schools”.

“Few people understand that the so called science of climate change is really what can be defined as ‘post-normal’ science,” he said, arguing it went beyond traditional understanding of science based on experimentation and falsifiable theories.

Another member spoke against the motion, saying he was concerned when people tried to dismiss differing opinions and he believed children to have access to all information.

The motion was nonetheless passed with overwhelming support from the LNP members at the gathering.

The “post-normal” science idea has obviously grabbed the attention of the local denier community following the visit of James Delingpole. One of the leading lights of the denier community, Delingpole ‘discovered‘ that this concept, proposed by a Marxist philosopher (of course!) was connected to climate science. So that’s it. It shows that all of this climate change stuff is definitely the work of watermelons (Delingpole’s favoured term of denigration for environmentalists).

The LNP government has unprecedented control of the Queensland parliament. What are the chances they’ll want to call in the eminent scientist Christopher Monckton to write the new science curriculum?

Update: Graham Readfearn has more on this story on his own blog, Climate Progress and DeSmogBlog.

Further update: Dr Richard Pearson, the LNP delegate mentioned above has posted the following comment (#25) on Graham Readfearn’s blog. It gives us a good indication of how much science he knows (and what a nice person he must be).

Keep frothing at the mouth if you want.
It only takes one ugly fact to disprove a beautiful theory in science.
The second law of thermodynamics means the ‘greenhouse effect theory’ is bunkum – look up these concepts.
Understand what ‘post normal science’ means.
Do an experiment yourself and try to prove your ideas – that just might be science. Then you will have some credibility.
regards Dr Richard Pearson

His claim that the greenhouse effect violates the second law of thermodynamics is, of course, a well known PRATT. Skeptical Science has a good debunking.