Covid, Climate and the 'Consensus Trap' —— By Steven E. Koonin and Scott W. Atlas

Three of the costliest policy failures in recent decades -- the 2008 financial crisis, the Covid lockdowns and the campaign for rapid decarbonization -- share a pathology we call the Consensus Trap. Problems began with the output of complex, unvalidated models presented as facts. Institutions and public figures under pressure to appear authoritative ignored uncertainties. Along with the press, these institutions and people became arbiters of truth, amplifying the declared consensus rather than critically assessing the evidence. Once "the science" was declared, dissent was treated as misconduct. In all three cases, as we examine in a paper with Terrence Keeley, the consensus was wrong and the public suffered severe consequences, while the architects of failure avoided accountability.

The 2008 crisis is the clearest example of a Consensus Trap in economic policy. Political incentives to expand homeownership, fee-driven enthusiasm on Wall Street, and Basel II capital rules built around rating-agency models combined to make a multitrillion-dollar subprime structure look safe when it was fragile. When economist Raghuram Rajan warned at Jackson Hole, Wyo., in 2005 that the system could crack, Lawrence Summers dismissed his premise as "slightly Luddite." Mr. Rajan was right. Millions of workers lost their jobs, and millions more lost their homes. Taxpayers paid for enormous bailouts, and no top executive of a major Wall Street bank went to prison.

Covid-19 had the same toxic mix, but in a public-health emergency. Beginning in 2020, policies allegedly following the science imposed lockdowns, prolonged school closings, church and business shutdowns, and vaccine mandates even for low-risk populations. But data available by the spring of 2020 showed that lethality was concentrated overwhelmingly among the elderly. Simple common sense argued instead for targeted protection. Those who said so -- including one of us, Dr. Atlas, from inside the White House -- faced attacks in the media and university censure. The collateral damage was sweeping, even beyond extra deaths: historic learning loss, a surge in youth self-harm, delayed and missed medical care, and economic devastation. The full human cost may never be known, yet few institutions have done after-action reviews.

Climate policy shows the same dynamic on a longer fuse. While greenhouse gases do warm the planet, the claim of inevitable catastrophe absent an energy transition -- which, conveniently, would be painless -- rests on implausible scenarios and on institutional incentives that reward alarm. Scientists who drew attention to that disconnect, such as Judith Curry, were assailed rather than debated.

Germany's environment minister stated that a consumer surcharge for renewable energy would cost households "as much as a scoop of ice cream" each month; it rose more than tenfold before being scrapped altogether in 2022. The emissions reductions achieved so far have had no detectable effect on the climate. As with subprime and Covid, the architects have faced little reckoning, and because climate consequences unfold over decades, they probably never will.

Accountability failed in each case. Alan Greenspan confessed his "shocked disbelief" and largely kept his standing. Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins collected awards and honorary degrees. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, whose summaries for policymakers are more alarming than the reports beneath them, retains the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. None of them paid a price remotely commensurate with the failure.

Open debate that airs dissent can reduce the likelihood of a Consensus Trap. A moderated online forum could make challenges to contested papers part of the scientific record. Federal research funding could be conditioned on universities demonstrating real protection of academic freedom. Congress could again have its own independent science advisers. And public after-action reviews could test the accuracy of consensus-based projections, as the military does, so that overconfidence carries a reputational cost.

The Reference Manual on Scientific Evidence, which guides federal judges in weighing expert testimony, was recently revised by the Federal Judicial Center and the National Academies. Its new foundational chapter, "How Science Works," links "widespread acceptance" to "the highest level of certainty science has to offer." Our examples show this to be untrue. Manufactured consensus too often guides the application of the law. An April letter to Chief Justice John Roberts co-authored by one of us, Mr. Koonin, explicitly asked that this chapter be withdrawn -- yet it continues to guide thousands of federal judges.

Expert input is essential to policymaking -- but avoiding policy debacles means understanding the experts' proper role. We should neither be wholly distrustful of expertise nor subservient to it without critical challenge. We must institute safeguards that make expertise trustworthy: transparency about uncertainty, protection for those who test it, and real consequences when things go wrong. Sound conclusions come from testing claims and debating evidence. "The science is settled" is often an attempt to foreclose vital debate.

We have paid dearly for ignoring that three times in the past two decades. Building those safeguards is how we avoid another Consensus Trap.

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Mr. Koonin served as undersecretary of energy for science, 2009-11. Dr. Atlas served as a special adviser to the president and a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force, 2020. Both are senior fellows at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 05, 2026 19:18 ET (23:18 GMT)