Measurements made by satellites. Sure. They’re handy. They’re impressive. They look fantastic in presentations and give journalists something clean and authoritative to point at. We can also read sea-level gauges. Actual instruments, bolted into real places, measuring real water. Every reasonably normal person can look at photographs more than a century old—of harbors, coastlines, quays, landmarks half-submerged or stubbornly dry—and see how things have changed. Or, inconveniently, how they haven’t.
But satellite data? That’s a different realm altogether. That’s the domain of those who own the satellites, operate them, process the data, model it, smooth it, correct it, adjust it, and then finally present it to the rest of us as a finished moral product. And how exactly are we—the less fortunate, non-orbital masses—supposed to verify any of it? We don’t get to peek behind the curtain. We get the conclusion, not the process.
Yes, satellites can do a lot of good things. No serious person denies that. But I increasingly have the uncomfortable feeling that we wildly overestimate their actual potential while dramatically underestimating the incentives of the institutions interpreting their output. A satellite does not speak. It does not scream. People scream—after the data has passed through enough layers of interpretation to become ideologically useful.
So what, exactly, are we supposed to do when the gauges on the ground show no increase, or only a negligible one, while the satellite-derived narrative insists that we are all about to drown? Do we believe our lying eyes, the boring instruments, the stubborn photographs—or the data as interpreted by institutions that would not exist, or would rapidly lose funding, relevance, and authority, if climate change were not recognized as an existential crisis?
In a species that actually questioned everything, this wouldn’t matter much. In a species that demanded proof from those serving it—real proof, transparent methods, reproducible claims—it wouldn’t matter at all. Those providing the satellite data would be forced, again and again, to demonstrate that what they say is true, not merely consistent with the story they need to tell.
But that is not the species we are.
We are not bold skeptics standing upright and interrogating power. We are closer to pond scum, craning our necks toward those “up there,” instinctively assuming they know better, must know better, and surely wouldn’t mislead us. We outsource judgment, then congratulate ourselves for trusting “the science,” even when what we are really trusting is authority wrapped in technical language.
And those perched comfortably above us—bathed in prestige, funding, access, and moral certainty—will not give up their perks easily. No system ever does. Especially not one that has learned how well fear travels when delivered from orbit.
