Consensus implies the existence of other views and, indeed, dissent. As consensus does not equal truth, truth demands that others get a hearing and that our ears remain open to the voice of dissent or what Lyotard called paralogy, the innovation of new concepts that emerge in thought oppositional to the established ways of thinking.
Of course, keeping an open ear doesn’t mean we refuse to act when consensus urges a course of action. Knowledge is never absolute, and prudence dictates that we act without perfect knowledge.
Despite what prudence dictates, no action will be forthcoming until something more compelling than the money and power available to politicians who serve the interests of the oligarchy who benefits from America's fossil fuel addiction. As I said in his commbox:
There seems to be an emerging strategy in the political organs that serve the interests of the Plutocracy: deny global warming until it is too late to act to mitigate it (such actions having the effect of limiting their ability to make as much money as possible), then break out the no-use-crying-over-spilt-milk arguments after it is safely too late to do anything about it.
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