But Is It True?: A Citizen's Guide to Environmental Health and Safety Issues

By Aaron Wildavsky

Book Overview

We've eaten Alar with our apples and PCBs with our fish, drunk arsenic with our water, breathed asbestos in our schools. Someone sounded the alarm, someone else said we were safe, and both had science on their side. Whom are we to trust? How are we to know? Amid this chaos of questions and conflicting information, Aaron Wildavsky arrives with just what the beleaguered citizen needs: a clear, fair, and factual look at how the rival claims of environmentalists and industrialists work, what they mean, and where to start sorting them out.

Working with his students at a risk analysis center, Wildavsky examined all the evidence behind the charges and countercharges in several controversial cases involving environmental health and public safety. Here he lays out these cases in terms an average citizen can understand, weighs the merits of the claims of various parties, and offers reasoned judgments on the government's response. From Love Canal to Times Beach, from DDT to Agent Orange, acid rain, and global warming, from saccharin to asbestos, nuclear waste, and radon, Wildavsky shows how we can achieve an informed understanding of the contentious environmental issues that confront us daily. The book supports the conclusion Wildavsky reached himself, both as a citizen committed to the welfare of the earth and its inhabitants, and as a social scientist concerned with how public policy is made: though it is bad to be harmed, it is worse to be harmed in the name of health.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0674089235
• ISBN13: 9780674089235
• Release Date: March 1997
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Length: 584 Pages
• Weight: 1.76 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.3" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

An important contribution to the debate over science and policy

This book is a refreshing corrective to the increasingly strident calls for government action on a range of issues from climate change to obesity. It asks the simple question 'But is it true?' and suggests that citizens inform themselves about the issues before reacting to media hype, overblown predictions of death and destruction and knee jerk policy reactions.

Dated, but brilliant

This is a brilliant book. While now dated, I seriously doubt that a new edition would do anything except reinforce its main conclusions. As to the claims of an earlier reviewer that "While some of the conclusions were warranted, most (including the overall points) were based on faulty analyses by an academic who had no training in the area upon which he expounds." The late Prof. Wildavsky, I am sure, would simply ask: "What is the evidence for your assertions?" "Are you sure you read the book?" "What is the book's title again?" What is with the cult of the "specialist"? Are we all to be subjected to worldviews of agenda driven experts? Are the military the only ones who can speak on military matters? Politicians on politics? Economists on economics? What are we to do when specialists differ? How does a jury member think about dueling expert witnesses? If anything the entire book is a cautionary tale about how to listen to "experts". Prof. Wildavsky spent much of his life studying the making of public policy - which in many instances involves translating scientific findings into regulations and legislation. This book is informed by years of scrutinizing what experts assert and what the reality is. His views on risk, issues emanating from the precautionary principle and the actions of well-meaning and self-interested lobbyists are based on decades of involvement in public policy debates. Prof. Wildavsky's book does an excellent job alerting the average citizen to the "gray" areas on many public policy issues.

The sky is falling...or is it?

Aaron Wildavsky attemps (successfully in my opinion) to clarify a couple of things with this book. #1 Scientific theory plus emotion does not equal scientific fact.#2 Scientific theory plus consensus does not equal scientific fact.The "Sky Is Falling" society will not like this book for obvious reasons (their own lack of objectivity being the biggest reason).History has been riddled with so called "facts" that were accepted by the majority of scientists at the time, but consensus alone does not equate to proof.Wildavsky's book is a good start - but the scientific community has a long road ahead when it comes to dealing with a general public that is largely ignorant of science. Environmentalists have a head start when it comes to winning the battle of public opinion - the scientific community must take books like Wildavsky's and "dumb it down" so that the average person with high school education or less can understand and make informed decisions.

A Reasoned Discussion of Environmental Issues

Wildavsky's book is a welcome addition to the discussion of environmental politics. He actually dares to challenge the received wisdom of environmental activists. I would have thought that a book that critically examines the claims of environmental dangers and uses scientific knowledge to do that would contribute to our understanding of threats to the environment. Clearly, there are extreme and varied claims for environmental dangers. "But Is It True" helps sort out the exaggerations from the real problems. It also does it in reasoned and unemotional language. I strongly reommend the book for anyone who is concerned about environmental issues rather than the rhetoric of activism.

A MUST Read!

This book is an essential tool for those who truly wish to understand more about environmental health and safety issues. Worried about global warming? Concerned about pesticide residues in food? Look no further than this reference. The author sets out to objectively evaluate environmental health issues. All sides of a particular issue are explored in depth. Those that do not stand up to scientific scrutiny are exposed. At the end of the book, an explanation of how environmental issues get reported is addressed.One of the most important parts of this book is that the author challenges the reader to become a responsible citizen. His premise is that becoming educated on these issues takes some work but is absolutely necessary in order to have the background to make informed decisions about important environmental issues. The book is extensively researched and referenced. It provides a greal deal of information on a variety of subjects from toxic scares to global warming. Although the information presented is technical, the authors do a comendable job of organizing the information into a readily understandable format.Absolutely a must read for anyone concerned about the environment.