Who would have known that fossil fuels are a special gift to humanity from the Divine?
Fred Palmer, that’s who. The Heartland Institute’s holy warrior senior fellow has revealed his elegant chain of reasoning: “Because it’s easy to get to, it’s here and more people live better and longer for it,” therefore “fossil fuels [are] part of a divine plan.”.
This is a guy who says that global warming science is “sophistry. It’s an agenda driven by lawyers who make their own facts. . . . ”
I ought to note here that if you are a Deist—which is the most minimal religious belief this side of atheism—of course all Creation is divine by definition. No argument here. But that’s not the sense in which Palmer makes claims about fossil fuels. He means to elevate fossil fuels above other objects of Creation, special gifts to humankind. Which seems to me a bit dismissive of stuff like oxygen (without which, incidentally, coal, oil, and gas would not burn; oh, but oxygen is used by other animals, so it’s not so special).