Perry invokes Galileo in defending his climate change doubts

GOP White House hopeful Rick Perry stood behind his doubts about climate change at his first debate appearance Wednesday night — and suggested Galileo would have his back.

Perry invoked the Italian scientist — who drew the Catholic Church’s wrath in the 1600s for arguing the Earth revolves around the sun — in claiming that human-induced climate change is an unsettled theory.

“The idea that we would put Americans' economy at ... jeopardy based on scientific theory that's not settled yet, to me, is just nonsense,” said Perry, the governor of Texas. “I mean ... and I tell somebody, I said, just because you have a group of scientists that have stood up and said here is the fact — Galileo got outvoted for a spell.”

Perry, on the stump last month, alleged that a “substantial number” of climate scientists have manipulated data to win money for projects. But he declined, when asked Wednesday, to name scientists he finds most credible on the topic.

Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman (R), who is not a climate skeptic but is trailing Perry badly in the polls, said that running against the scientific consensus on climate change is a losing hand for the GOP politically.

“When you make comments that fly in the face of what 98 out of 100 climate scientists have said, when you call into question the science of evolution, all I'm saying is that, in order for the Republican Party to win, we can't run from science,” Huntsman said during the debate at the Reagan Presidential Library in California.

The vast majority of scientists argue that the planet is heating up and human activities — notably burning fossil fuels — are a major reason why.

For instance, the National Research Council, in a report this year, noted that climate change is “very likely caused primarily” by human-induced greenhouse gas emissions.

---