NASA Study: Aliens Could Attack Earth to End Global Warming
We've all heard of the ravaged rain forests and the plight of the polar bear. But as far as reasons for saving the planet go, the one offered by scientists Thursday is truly out of this world. A team of American researchers have produced a range of scenarios in which aliens could attack the earth, and curiously, one revolves around climate change.I refuse to respond to this rehash of 2008's The Day the Earth Stood Still. Instead let me just say that I'm always amazed when such idiocy gets released. And this phenomenon does not arise solely in academia; it's everywhere, such as my own personal favorite - the wretched Google Instant. Bill Simmons has referred to this in sports as teams needing a "Vice President of Common Sense." Inexplicably, sometimes the most absurd and idiotic ideas get greenlighted through a chain of people, with each individual seemingly missing the obviously horrible nature of the idea. So you end up with "New Coke", Microsoft Bob, and "we need to do something about global warming because of aliens" despite the public at large immediately rejecting this garbage.
The thought-provoking scenario is one of many envisaged in a joint study by Penn State and the NASA Planetary Science Division, entitled "Would Contact with Extraterrestrials Benefit or Harm Humanity? A Scenario Analysis." [Only those in the Ivory Tower could make recycled sci-fi sound esoteric.]
ETI could attack us out of selfishness or out of a more altruistic desire to protect the galaxy from us. We might be a threat to the galaxy just as we are a threat to our home planet," it warns. It speculates that aliens, worried we might inflict the damage done to our own planet on others, might "seek to preemptively destroy our civilization in order to protect other civilizations from us."
Gore says Eat less meat to fight warming:
Al Gore wants society to ditch meat-heavy diets and go organic to combat global warming. "Industrial agriculture is a part of the problem,” Gore said Friday during an interview with FearLess Revolution founder Alex Bogusky. “The shift toward a more meat-intensive diet,” the clearing of forest areas in many parts of the world in order to raise more cattle and the reliance on synthetic nitrogen for fertilizer are also problems, he added.I hate to admit the impressively comprehensive nature of leftist doctrine. In addition to lies about nutritional value, the left has found yet another way to countenance the vegetarian, low-fat paradigm. As we've discussed before, the left has erected a parallel institution to traditional religion, even going so far as to couch food choices in moral, social, and intellectual contexts. I've gotten some flak from outside commenters for connecting vegetarianism to liberalism, but at least some mainstream pundits have also noticed, with Michelle Malkin sardonically referring to the "Berkeley" special.
I can't discern the possible irony of this last article, as we know liberals experience almost everything with a haughty sneer. Nonetheless, I'll link to this article from Alternet entitled 10 Best Movies Where Humanity Gets Its Comeuppance. The article basically celebrates large-scale snuff films as Gaia's justified moral revenge:
Humankind’s intelligence combined with our unrelenting desire to live longer and dominate the planet is, ironically, our fatal flaw. Pop culture forever reminds us that we are disgusting creatures with deplorable habits that will ultimately be the end of us, and fortunately for fans of the apocalypse, cinema in particular loves to depict our agonizing deaths in vivid, epic color.Each film shows millions of humans dying at the hands of nature, with the article presenting nature as a sentient being exacting revenge on us environmental heathens. The author writes with a subtly sarcastic tone, but the basic ideals do find support within environmentalist groups. Sometimes, I really do think soft-Gaiaists consider nature as morally superior to humans and the prevalence of doomsday films, showing human deaths in gory detail, reflects this popular notion.
Since there are a thousand ways for humanity to die, here are some of the more creative films in which terrible, irresponsible humanity gets its final comeuppance. Our end may be imminent, but at least we get to watch some awesome stuff beforehand. Enjoy!
Finally, regarding the hurricane - at this point I haven't researched enough to assert if the actual storm matched the predictions. But it does appear that the media relies heavily on "alarmism", with dire warnings on weather, public safety crises, disease, childhood dangers, and everyday hazards coming out frequently. Perhaps this is a contentious point, but I actually think our population might suffer from overemployment, with many of these individuals justifying their jobs in nanny state government offices, punditry, academia, and think-tanks by exaggerating potential problems. I imagine also that this constant state of fear is intended to encourage the influence of large institutions, especially of government. But I'll refrain from musing further on this huge topic.
93 comments:
It is a seriously nutty idea. Any species capable of interstellar travel should be able to notice human technology by other means, like I dunno, this:
http://jtintle.wordpress.com/2008/10/05/earth-at-night/
I think the cat is out of the bag guys.
First of all, the Gore comment is completely correct. Though you may not believe in global warming, the gases that are suspected of causing it are overwhelmingly from the meat industry. So, if enough people eat less meat, and the meat industry shrinks, then less of these gases will be released, and numerically, this will have more of an impact than eliminating worldwide vehicle transportation.
As for the first comment, well, it does make a good premise for a movie. And, if let's say there's a benign hands off advanced alien civilization supervising various star systems, it wouldn't be absurd to say that they would be disturbed by humanity's rapacity.
What kind of protein powder do you buy? Also, have you read anything about it possibly being harmful? I once had a doctor tell me he doesn't recommend protein shakes because they damage the liver.
It is a shame that global warming has become a political issue because the science behind it clearly favors the "liberal" stance. The global mean temperature has risen slowly over the past few decades and the production of greenhouse gases has been directly correlated with this increase. Whether liberal or conservative, the issue is a serious one and only science can solve this ultimately scientific question. Al Gore or not, modern climate science will sooner or later shed more light on these potentially damaging effects og human progress.
The idea of an alien invasion is Hollywood hype only. Serious exploration of our planetary system long ago essentially eliminated all speculation about "Martians" and other invaders. Back in the 50's there was an epidemic of books about Saturnian visiters,etc, etc. The scientific truth is entirely different. Nowhere is there any life in our solar system.
There are, however, some excellent books out there from Michio Kaku and Paul Davies. Real physics has much to say about our future and all of it is bad if your hope is eternal life. The Second Law of Thermodynamics spells out our future: a sea of random particles bouncing aimlessly forever. Time itself will not exist in this chaos that is inevitable. It will be cold, dark, and random.
Better enjoy life as it is right now. Even the theory of multiple universes will not save you from the 2nd Law.
That ET study is as stupid as you say but it has also been grossly misreported. It had nothing to do with NASA except that one of the graduate students who wrote it happens to work at NASA. It was never anything official.
Oh for pity's sake...
This is the third post on this subject since I started reading this blog, and every time you've gotten your causal relationships as completely screwed up and backasswards as any DWL blaming black academic failure and criminality on "institutional racism".
Vegetarianism has always had its fad adherents. The Bauhaus school of design in the 1930's went vegetarian for a while, to the extent that Alma Mahler Gropius (ex-wife of composer Gustav Mahler) said that the most unforgettable characteristic of the Bauhaus style was "garlic on the breath." Hippies following Eastern (esp. Hindu) philosophy in the 1960's often went vegetarian. Recently, "Straight edge" is vegetarian (and drug-free).
The arguments for vegetarianism have always been varied and mutable, but now you're trying to use some of the current set to try to attack climate science. This plays well with the current dogma of the US Right, but to everyone else all this does is make you look like a fool. If the Left said that Vitamin D was good for you and everyone should get some sun, take extra in the diet or both, would you stay in the basement and avoid enriched foods and supplements? That's the kind of silly reactionary thinking you show here.
Global warming science is much older than the current incarnation of the leftist movement in the USA, let alone its talking points. It goes back to Svante Arrhenius' paper in 1896, which is available on-line (in English; you have no excuse not to read it). It is not concocted to drive a political, dietary, or any other agenda. You might as well claim that the "scare" over environmental lead was designed to hurt the oil and auto industries. Instead, the elimination of lead from auto fuel and paint slashed the incidence of heavy-metal poisoning and retardation.
Bringing up something on Fox News about scientists asked to speculate about aliens (should they exist) is the silliest reason to support AGW denial that I've ever seen. It's real crackpot territory, and you should be ashamed to have written such a thing.
The left's policy prescriptions are often disingenuous, but in this case the science is right. You can tell what the policy goals are from things like the Alternet article you railed about, specifically what they leave out. The spin leaves nuclear power out in the interstellar vacuum, getting fewer words than Ron Paul on MSNBC.
Essentially all AGW-denialism has its roots in coal interests fighting to keep nuclear from eating their lunch. They have their paid pseudo-scientists, they own the Republican party and they've co-opted the Democrats through the anti-nuclear environmental factions (which they fund through foundation contributions). This is simple, direct and obvious: follow the money.
Going into elaborate conspiracy theorizing just marks you as credulous, illogical and easily-led. This damages you: if you're that shaky in an area of public debate where the science is so solid and the field so unified against your position, why should anyone believe what you say about race and HBD?
When you're in a hole, stop digging.
The ET paper is just liberal projection: an advanced entity has no need to study or share, it just kills those who don't measure up.
Essentially all AGW-denialism has its roots in coal interests fighting to keep nuclear from eating their lunch.
??? You're a fine one to lecture about credibility.
I once had a doctor tell me he doesn't recommend protein shakes because they damage the liver.
If you have kidney damage, eating too much protein can put a strain on your already weakened kidneys. But if your kidneys are in good shape, I wouldn't worry about it.
You're a fine one to lecture about credibility.
Oh, right. No company or organization ever used lobbying or PR to try to damage or defeat a direct market competitor. For instance, other auto companies didn't circulate rumors that the hydraulic brakes of the Rickenbacker 6 were unsafe.
Oh, wait, they did.
Follow the money, but first, Fred, you need to buy a clue about human nature and greed.
Though you may not believe in global warming, the gases that are suspected of causing it are overwhelmingly from the meat industry...
...if enough people eat less meat, and the meat industry shrinks, then less of these gases will be released,
Stop feeding cattle grain and they'll stop producing so much methane.
And start grazing bison (which "sustainably" feed on naturally occurring North American vegetation) on the bazillion acres currently dedicated to (subsidized) grain production. Massive bison herds existed on grasslands that required no additional fertilizer or water.
Gore and other veg-brains never consider that grains are petrol intensive when nutrient density is considered. Not to mention the anti nutrients in grain and the health consequences of replacing animal fats with concentrated PUFA oils (which are in EVERYTHING!)
Pastured ruminants are sustainable and thee most nutrient dense source of food man has access too.
Oh, right. No company or organization ever used lobbying or PR to try to damage or defeat a direct market competitor.
I'm well aware of such things.
I just see that:
)the coal industry is weak politically
)nuclear needs no push from coal to fail.
Any coal campaign against nuclear is small beans. In many ways they are in the same boat, and run by the same people.
I cancelled a date because of the big bad hurricane. Mistake.
)the coal industry is weak politically
Meanwhile, mountain-top removal mining continues while stream beds are filled in direct violation of water-quality rules.
)nuclear needs no push from coal to fail.
Even Greens are now saying it's safer than coal and oil. It took the coal industry a good number of years to get regulation of nuclear power taken away from the AEC and given to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission with an effective charter to block essentially all reactor construction and progress. The NRC has not approved any truly new reactor designs since it was founded; everything in the USA is either a PWR or BWR.
Do you think the NRC wasn't the brainchild of coal lobbyists? Look at the explosion of US nuclear generation from 1970 to 1980 to 1990, and tell me that the coal industry would just yawn.
The irony is that the NRC has made us less safe, not just from coal pollution, but from nuclear accidents. Three Mile Island Unit 2 failed because an NRC-mandated instrument failed and misled the operators. TMI Unit 1, completed pre-NRC, is still running.
It took the coal industry a good number of years to get regulation of nuclear power taken away from the AEC and given to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
This sounds too convenient.
The coal industry I know spends more time competing with each other than with the nuclear side. Coal seems to lose every time a new air quality standard is suggested, or someone wants to block a rail line.
If the locals want it, it will go through (mountain top mining). Otherwise, not so much.
Just a heads up:
Uncle Tim Wise expounds on the "Moral Absurdity of Race Realism":
http://www.timwise.org/2011/08/race-intelligence-and-the-limits-of-science-reflections-on-the-moral-absurdity-of-racial-realism/#.TllbEoKs1fE.facebook
Uncle Tim Wise expounds
I can't help but like Uncle Tim's underlying vibe that only he and his are smart enough to realize that everyone is equal. The less enlightened, in his view, if allowed to act upon their irrational prejudices, are destined to live in an impoverished world. I guess we should thank Uncle Tim for his efforts to make our lives better.
Honestly if I would not be prosecuted I would beat Tim Wise to death. I hate his smug demeanor and attempt to look like a man with his fagg yuppie beard. Never have I seen him win a debate and I have watched more than a few. I may hate Al and Jessy but at least they are entertaining Wise is just scum.
MuayTyson
It does appear that Wise realizes the wheels are coming off the blank slater cart, but his arguments in favor of the educational status quo are unconvincing.
I love the way that Wise refers to the "inadequacy of scientific inquiry" but expects his opinions as a loudmouth with a BA in Poli Sci to be taken with absolute seriousness.
I especially loved this bit:
And should we construct a society around the notion of rewarding people for the traits they merely inherited, and which, even if taken for granted, they could not help but possess? Or should we place a higher premium on effort and perseverance, such that those who begin with a skill deficit and yet put forth maximum exertion to achieve their goals become those we reward and seek to emulate?
Right, the gifted people who created the modern world and made it possible for Wise to fly from conference to conference and communicate to millions via the internet deserve no credit, since their labors must have come easily to them.
I second what Cornelius Troost said.
OneSTDV and Roissy sound like fucking morons with this AGW-denial-masquerading-as "skepticism" bullshit.
Our way of life is absurd on so many levels...you are missing what might go down as the most important one. Wake the hell up.
The party is over.
OneSTDV's "skepticism" isn't even logically consistent. If you haven't seen the contradictions in the August 10 post, I'll be on them soon.
@ Bill and Troost:
My skepticism goes like this:
1) It's undeniable that academia and media lies.
2) They especially like to lie when the particular lie supports leftism, e.g. examples being HBD and vegetarianism.
3) They lie by putting out horribly designed studies and often just plain lying.
So then we look at AGW. It's essentially the manifestation of modern liberalism. So that's definitely piques my interest. Then Climategate hit showing that academic researchers use the same tricks and lies that underpin vegetarianism and HBD. Well we're getting somewhere. Then you watch videos like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWEu4Yz76Ro&feature=player_embedded
And one notes how climate science has become a modern religion with absurd levels of aggressive fervency amongst the believers (see this post for examples), much like the lies of vegetarianism and racial egalitarianism.
If you wonder how this stuff gets pushed around, go vegetarian, Aliens are coming to kill us for being mean to Gaia, and all that, its religion.
People need to believe in something. They can't mostly except for a few High IQ people believe in nothing. They have to have something. Hence the whole Gaia stuff and so on.
If you want to understand the Nanny Welfare state, it is harnessing the religious impulse, particularly strong among professional/upper class White women (see Carry Nation, the Temperance Movement) to ... tell people how to live their lives. That's deeply gender embedded.
Most guys don't care much about anything other than performance. Your team's coach is a fat slob, a "racist" or "anti-racist" or what have you, but wins a lot? Who cares? Bill Belechick can chew on his hoodie all he wants, New England fans love him ... as long as he wins. Performs.
Almost all of modern liberalism including yes Tim Wise being someone with a modest following and social power instead of some lunatic on a pillar in the desert consists of harnessing the innate Calvinistic attitude to running every little detail of other people's lives, and the desire to enforce "moral improvement" ala the Temperance Movement.
Troost -
"It is a shame that global warming has become a political issue because the science behind it clearly favors the "liberal" stance. The global mean temperature has risen slowly over the past few decades and the production of greenhouse gases has been directly correlated with this increase. Whether liberal or conservative, the issue is a serious one and only science can solve this ultimately scientific question. Al Gore or not, modern climate science will sooner or later shed more light on these potentially damaging effects og human progress."
These correlative effects mean nothing. Consider the Ice Age. You remember that? You remember how much of North America was covered in ice hundreds or even thousands of feet thick? Do you remember this occurring thousands of years before man-made fossil fuels ever came into existence?
In other words, the world's temperature dropped to such a low level that much of the planet was covered in ice. All of this happened a long time before man was ever involved. Doesn't that hint to you on some level that there are powerful forces operating on this planet beyond the influence or control of man?
For those arguing about greed and credibility:
It does not matter how corrupt or greedy coal/nuclear/oil or other such companies really are. Consider this thought experiment. Let's assume we get rid of all of the coal companies, all of the nuclear companies and all of the oil companies. What changes? If my car runs out of gas, then I have to refill it. If a room is dark and I need light, then I'm gonna flip a switch; if it is cold, then I want heat.
The typical liberal complaint against fossil fuel companies, big pharma, agribusiness, and other boogeyman is pointless because what these companies do will still need to be done even if the firms ceased to exist. Liberals act as if the Western Fuels Association, for example, is holding the planet hostage by forcing it to use gas. The reality? The timely production and distribution of food, fuel, medicine and host of other products forms a critical infrastructure necessary for civilization's survival.
Climate "science", global warming and other such nonsense are attacking the function of that critical infrastructure. Al Gore and his supporters are terrorists and criminals who should spend the rest of their lives in prison for what they say.
What I don't like about criticism of meat eating is often how it is used to criticise males and Westerners as stupid and users of inefficient agricultural systems.
Westerners used lots of meat because it was an efficient system in Europe where vegetable protein and fat and textile sources were lacking, as among the peoples of Tibet and the pastoral peoples, and because it gave access to high quantities of fertiliser and cheap labour substitution (animal power).
When vegan commentators engage with this, they just tend to assume that a relatively high level of meat eating, compared to Asian, Native American and Middle Eastern agriculturalists, is a uniquely Western "vice" because Western people are stupid or there's something wrong with Western culture (we're a "greedy culture of excess"), when in fact it was a pretty damn smart response by our ancestors to the conditions they faced.
Now, once we industrialised, yes, our meat consumption rose again, because it tastes good and because meat consumption pretty much always rises with wealth.
Now we may be eating enough meat (although if so, substituting carbs and sugar for that meat is probably an awful idea, c.f. obestity epidemic), but the way our history of meat consumption is framed by Eastern looking vegans to make Westerners look greedy or stupid is just blatent ignorance and slander and driven by anti-Western sentiment.
the way our history of meat consumption is framed by Eastern looking vegans to make Westerners look greedy or stupid is just blatent ignorance and slander and driven by anti-Western sentiment.
Excellent comment. I pursued a slightly different, but related argument when I first started thinking about this last summer:
http://onestdv.blogspot.com/2010/07/real-white-men-eat-meat-how.html
When radical liberals rail against man-made global warming they are actually railing against man acting. Period. But they are not just railing against any man's actions, they are seeking to minimize the actions of white man.
If radical liberals were serious about combatting man-made global warming then they would call for the easiest and most guaranteed solution which would be an instant halt to all immigration from third to first world.
Because they are radical liberals, though, they are not bound to any principled stance. And yet they are bound to a principled end. And so the radical liberal will combat man-made global warming in a different manner. He will self-annihilation. He will encourage most persuasively a mass culling, a self-sacrifice. He will clamor for the white man to stop acting all together. But most importantly, he will lead by example.
Well, atmospheric science is so inherently full of uncertainty. The sensitivity to initial conditions and the amount of variables acting...I mean, who really knows what we don't know?
But burning the amounts of carbon that we have/do/will is a BIG deal folks. When algea releases that much, it changes the atmosphere and planet dramatically.
I think we've probably screwed the atmosphere up, but I can't stand the preening liberals pretending that they're going to do something about it.
My question is this, to to the Wealth of Nations-thumpers: What about all the crap in the ocean? Do you not see THAT as a problem?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_Garbage_Patch
I'm of the paleo persuasion, btw...
It's amazing that one could publish a scientific paper on aliens invading Earth. Crazy really.
There was global warming before people therefore people can't be creating global warming now? That's as daft as supposing that since many animals went extinct that humans can't cause animal species to become extinct.
The real question instead is: does it matter? The globally warmed Medieval period was beneficial for Europeans whose cold climates were suddenly cosy. By the same extension would future global warming be beneficial for some nations but bad for others? If the rich nations are going to be better off yet poor nations could in fact be worse then there's not going to be much change.
P.S. If some here think Lefties are all talk and no action then that would be a good thing, right?
It's pretty funny that the denialists here practically worship Michael Crichton (educated as a medical doctor), but probably couldn't force themselves to do the skeptic/denialist quiz written by (scientist) David Brin.
Brin addresses OneSTDVs point about autodidacts, too.
OneSTDV makes a profound point re the MSM creating alarmism. They are indeed masters of much propaganda and their general thrust is toward BIG government. They recently exaggerated the dangers from Irene to an obscene degree. One can only view the MSM with deep skepticism.
That said, OneSTDV wrongfully equates the MSM with science. Over many years I have worked with outstanding scientists, discussed problems with them, and found them uniformly more honest than any other genre I can imagine. As a profession scientists have the highest standards in the land. The number of scams or scandals are minescule compared to the general trend compiling facts and theories that form the foundation of human knowledge.
If you haven't dealt first-hand with science, it is easy to jump on the East Anglia debacle and castigate all science. That generalization is false. Scientists have built the vast structure of empirical knowledge by being basically honest and consistent. The mechanism of self-correction helps keep cheaters at bay.
The Media are easily manipulated by political powers but science is far more honest and competent. SJ Gould did lie in his Mismeasurement of Man,while HBD does terrify some biologists while leftist biologists sound off with great gusto and bravado, but most of the best, like James Crow and A.W.F. Edwards,and Henry Harpending, remain strong allies of our side. The raw ugliness of our grand culture wars will indeed seep into the cracks of our scientific establishment, but when liberals like Norm Levitt and Paul Gross write Higher Superstition: The Academic Left and its Quarrels with Science, one again sees that science will rise up in favor of truth. The entire quest of science is, after all, truth.
You people have long progressed past farce, and are a party of traitors.
You people have long progressed past farce, and are a party of traitors.
Considering that our public discourse is beyond farce, and radical change/treason is called for, I find that to be a compliment. I shall carry on.
The NASA article was admitted to be a joke. The people at NASA understand that life evolving requires very specific conditions that are so strict that the odds are an astronomically big number to one.
Also, with Special Relativity and c as the universal speed limit and the vast distances in space anyone can say with absolute certainty that Earth will never be invaded by extraterrestrials.
"The Second Law of Thermodynamics spells out our future: a sea of random particles bouncing aimlessly forever.” Yes, but that is 10^100 years from now.
"If you want to understand the Nanny Welfare state, it is harnessing the religious impulse, particularly strong among professional/upper class White women (see Carry Nation, the Temperance Movement) to ... tell people how to live their lives. That's deeply gender embedded.
Most guys don't care much about anything other than performance. Your team's coach is a fat slob, a ‘racist’ or ‘anti-racist’ or what have you, but wins a lot? Who cares? Bill Belechick can chew on his hoodie all he wants, New England fans love him ... as long as he wins. Performs."
But alcohol consumption reduces one's performance in every endeavor. It causes IQ reduction, creates health problems, and increases violent tendencies. Historically, alcohol has prevented people from becoming successful in their trade or profession.
"If you haven't dealt first-hand with science, it is easy to jump on the East Anglia debacle and castigate all science. That generalization is false. Scientists have built the vast structure of empirical knowledge by being basically honest and consistent. The mechanism of self-correction helps keep cheaters at bay.
The Media are easily manipulated by political powers but science is far more honest and competent."
The contrast between scientists vs. the media and politics is stark one. Charlatans fear business and science because those areas have very difficult to fake results, as they are grounded in competitive efforts for success whereas in religion, politics, the media, and academia all have greater deception potential.
Capitalism is the optimal economic system in which scientific and technological advancement can flourish via competition and free enterprise.
Troost -
I'm sorry, I have to call BS on your comment about science. Your argument sounds suspiciously similar to one the communists used to make.
Communists used to insist that the boots-on-the-ground results of their programs should never be confused with "real" communism. Why, gulags and famines and poverty don't matter because, hidden away from public view, there exist the "real" communists who are dedicated and well-intentioned public servants whose only calling is the betterment of mankind.
Your insistence on the dedicated and outstanding scientists hidden away from public view smacks of this same bait-and-switch. Worse, it is factually wrong.
Most scientists spend their lives doing mediocre and irrelevant research. They answer questions no one asked, make discoveries of little or no value, and solve geek puzzles about which no one cares. The "outstanding dedication" you observe occurs in some cliquish "Dungeons and Dragons" universe, where the nerds impose rules on each other in anything but the real world.
Climate "science" represents the interface between academia, government, the media and money. The geek, taken out of World of Warcraft, is not only easily corrupted by the real world, he is a willing participant in that corruption.
The is the reality...the boots-on-the ground reality.
Jay M seems to have more than an adequate understanding of science and he defends my position very well. Doing my doctoral dissertation on the teaching of evolution, I was astonished at the help I was able to get from the Nobel laureate H. J. Muller and the Harvard paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson. They took the time to assess my work in great detail, forcing me to be more careful with technical terms and claims. It opened my eyes to the critical importance of honesty in the scientific enterprise.
We must be ever careful to protect science from genuine nut cases like Rick Perry, who obviously shares the beliefs of country bumpkins re evolution. Our friend Larry Auster has a similar hangup but he is smarter than Perry. Tim Wise is a sophisticated thinker whose deep emotional invovement with blank slate liberalism generates very erroneous thinking in an otherwise very smart guy. Science has its "hot topics" like HBD that will divide us in cultural warfare, but HBD happens to be supported with mountains of evidence that is less clear in the case of global warming. Nonetheless, the consequences are too great for us to join the Rick Perrys of the world. Most scientists concur about its serious status so we ought to lean toward them rather than play political games. Thanks to Jay M.
That is the is the reality...the boots-on-the ground reality.
Troost -
You are also wrong about peer-review and self-correction. There is far less peer review in science than there is in, say, accounting. The accounting profession has a dedicated field called auditing where one group of accountants checks another group of accountants. There is no dedicated group of scientists who sit around replicating the work of their peers.
CERN experiment shows that sun's magnetic field likely causes Earth's temperature fluctuations:
http://www.docudharma.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=27325
For map:
You do indeed need a map. To use an analogy with the USSR is most improper. We know well the sins of Stalinist science and they bear little relationship to American science. Remember "cold fusion?" How far did that scheme go? Fraudulent science is usually found out quickly and exposed.Your paranoia belongs in a really totalitarian society.
The denialist posters here, starting with OneSTDV, are tragicomic. I'll get back to the One in a second, but I'd like to first bring up the example of poster "map":
“These correlative effects mean nothing. Consider the Ice Age. You remember that? You remember how much of North America was covered in ice hundreds or even thousands of feet thick? Do you remember this occurring thousands of years before man-made fossil fuels ever came into existence?”
Map's knowledge of the subject is obviously drawn from talk-radio and Fox News commentators. Had map had a decent science education in K-12, he'd know that the glaciations and interglacials have been largely due to Milankovic cycles in the eccentricity of Earth's orbit, the variation in Earth's axial tilt and the phase difference between the point of aphelion and summer solstice. Northern hemisphere springs and summers occurring around aphelion, when Earth moves slowest in its orbit, provide more long, warm days to melt snow and ice. Short summers allow it to build up. Greater orbital eccentricity and greater axial tilt makes the cycles stronger. The feedback effects are more complex, but the forcing function is external to Earth's biosphere and easily understood.
This is high-school level stuff. Map didn't know it, but he is nevertheless certain that he's Right with a capital R. Tragicomic; I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Map continues:
“Doesn't that hint to you on some level that there are powerful forces operating on this planet beyond the influence or control of man?”
Yes, yes it does. And this is utterly irrelevant to the case for AGW, which is based on a man-made rather than natural forcing function. But he'd have to understand some science to grasp that point. He gets worse, confusing political talking points with science and calling for people to be jailed for what they say, but that's just more dung on an already smelly heap. (continued next comment)
OneSTDV, who is very keen to pick out people denying racial realities (and rightly so, "the truth shall set you free"), throws methodology to the wind when the issue is climate change.
“1) It's undeniable that academia and media lies.”
It's obvious that the media lie, and many academics lie (e.g. Michael Bellesisles, who got his richly-deserved comeuppance) but here OneSTDV commits the fallacy of composition. Climate researchers are hard-science practitioners, not gender- and ethnic-studies crypto-Marxists. Their work is also subject to peer review. Best of all, if the entire current paradigm is wrong, it just takes one researcher fixing the error and matching theory to observations to overturn the whole field (and often get a Nobel prize). If OneSTDV thinks this is conducive to mass conspiracies, he hasn't actually thought about it... or he's nowhere near the thinker he thinks he is.
“2) They especially like to lie when the particular lie supports leftism, e.g. examples being HBD and vegetarianism.”
To demonstrate this, OneSTDV needs to show that the specific scientists involved in climate science practice leftist politics. It's easy to find research showing that fuzzy-studies programs like History and Sociology have strongly left-leaning faculty, but I couldn't find any such survey for chemists and physicists (two of the essential fields relating to climatology), and I doubt he has any. AAMOF, I doubt he's bothered to look.
“3) They lie by putting out horribly designed studies and often just plain lying.”
This is extremely ironic, because back on August 10 the One said "Must we all do our own investigations in reading the actual studies and uncovering the specious statistical analyses and misleading conclusions therein? Hopefully not, as I don't have the time". He admits he wouldn't know if the studies are well-designed or not; he's just certain that everyone in the field (except a paltry few "skeptics") is lying.
Everyone. A mass conspiracy of low-paid flunkies (the average Fortune 500 CEO makes tens of times the salary of the average academic), with no one willing to point out errors which could make their reputations and scientific careers. This is simply not credible. Meanwhile, the incentives of the $34 billion/year US coal industry and $multi-hundred-billion/year oil industry in the USA get a pass from him. They wouldn't employ paid liars to increase their profits... would they?
No intellectual independence, no credibility. With friends like OneSTDV, race-realism doesn't need enemies.
(I understand why OneSTDV is doing this. He wants acceptance, or is just getting tired of having to exercise willpower. His resistance to the right-wing dogma is breaking down, with his acceptance of the pro-life and AGW-denial planks removing two areas of difference with the party line. But that doesn't make those positions intellectually valid or factually correct. OneSTDV would not hesitate to point out that kind of pressure to conform coming from the left, which is the saddest part of all. It makes him a hypocrite.)
"TalkradioTalkradioTalkradio"
"FoxnewsFoxnewsFoxnews"
"TragicomicTragicomicTragicomic"
Convincing, eh? And don't even get me started on the misinformation spewed about "apolitical" science - I myself posted, several weeks ago, how climate alarmists proposed an interdisciplinary political/social/scientific push towards marginalizing their foes. This was discovered with, I dunno, a two second Google search. Yes, I I know, it's comforting to make sweeping claims ("apolitical climate science") when you think you're not likely to get called on 'em...
Oh Lord…
Thank you, Analytical, for proving my point. If the Milankovic cycle theory is correct (and it sounds preposterous), then such orbital variations completely swamp whatever effects man-made greenhouse gases have on the planet. Climate scientists predict that 2-6 degree differences in the average world temperature due to man, yet the Ice Age resulting from the Milankovic cycle dropped the average world temperature to below freezing and then raised the world temperature within the range it is today. That is a temperature difference from Antarctic cold to modern temperate.
There you have it: the powerful force acting upon the biosphere that is actually determinative of climate change, not the AGW theory so loved by the Democrat’s scientific pets.
Word to the wise: simply providing a taxonomy of scientific explanations does not make the explanation true. It is also important to match what you are talking about to the topic at hand.
Troost -
"Fraudulent science is usually found out quickly and exposed.Your paranoia belongs in a really totalitarian society."
Uh no...fraudulent science that makes preposterous claims that can be easily verified in a controlled experiment get found out. Climate science has no such easy control. That is why the fraud is constantly pushed.
Cornelius Troost,
You are wrong to believe that only "science" will solve man-made global warming. A more discerning eye would see that radical liberalism is already ahead of the game in summoning a final solution.
Have the white man self-annihilate and you will solve man-made global warning. That is radical liberalism in a nutshell.
You also need to parse the debate. There is the debate concerning more actionable man creating a more heated environment. Very possible, very commensical, but ultimately, no evidence of perpetualness requiring drastic action by counter-actionable man. Scientists have put forth a plausible mechanism and their models have shown them what they expected. But they are simply not accounting for the inevitable unraveling of radical liberalism. Then there is the debate as to whether an increasingly actionable man creating a more heated environment is disasterous. Again, possible, but no "science" giving us one truth or the other. And lastly, there are the doomsday scenarios. Very simply, no "science" whatsoever to back the assertions. Good scientists ARE NOT at the front of any of these debates controlling the discourse. That's a fact.
"Fraudulent science is usually found out quickly and exposed.Your paranoia belongs in a really totalitarian society.
map is correct in noting that this only applies to laboratory science and engineering.
But as someone familiar with HBD and academia/media's persistent attacks on it (in addition to their 50 year lie about saturated fat and essentially the rest of nutrition), I'm shocked you view organized science as bereft of bias.
I think you're too attached to the notion of science as this pristine institution, the crusading "science" of Newton and Galileo instead of Oz, Nisbett, and Gore (to name just three). I had was too, until I discovered paleo dieting and HBD, then I realized how bad politically motivated science is.
View that video I linked to see what "peer review" and "data" they use.
How Analytical can a person be who "chooses" mechanical "consciousness" over the exercise of maximum moral autonomy?
How Analytical can a mechanically "conscious" person be that embraces self-annihilation by asserting his mother's fundamental "right" to kill the Analyst in utero?
We don't need more Analytics these days. They all point towards imminent death.
Analytical -
Everyone. A mass conspiracy of low-paid flunkies (the average Fortune 500 CEO makes tens of times the salary of the average academic), with no one willing to point out errors which could make their reputations and scientific careers. This is simply not credible. Meanwhile, the incentives of the $34 billion/year US coal industry and $multi-hundred-billion/year oil industry in the USA get a pass from him. They wouldn't employ paid liars to increase their profits... would they?"
The purpose of a conspiracy is not the conspiracy itself. Like-minded individuals find each other and can easily agree on what courses of action are beneficial for their cause and what needs to be hidden fro the public.
The corporate conspiracies to increase profits or power are far less damaging to society than the climate/leftist/media axis conspiracy that seeks to shut down industrial civilization.
I mean, there is no comparison. As I've written elsewhere, if all of the oil, natural gas,coal and nuclear companies disappeared, nothing would change. We would still need oil, gas, coal and nuclear. As long as the oil, gas and coal is reliably delivered and reasonably affordable, then whatever conspiracies these companies hatch are small potatoes.
What is not acceptable is the cadre of government-funded, abnormally-socialized malcontents insisting that 300 million people need to go back to 19th century technology based on some fart analyzed in an ice-core sample.
Cornelius Troost,
Really, what is an atheist "scientist?" Are scientists really without personal politics and God-complexes? Isn't the atheist "scientist" just a perversion of the real scientist who was and will always be inspired by God, first? Isn't the atheist "scientist" just a necessarily unreliable self-refutation? Whether humans ever were, they are certainly no longer under the influence of the natural selection mechanism. Self-annihilation is a chosen path and it shall be the genes that trigger this self-destruct button. You still call this "evolution" while denying that you're inspired to unlock God's workings by calling it "science."
What do you call this type of person?
LOL, so not only are atheists incapable of appreciating art, they can't even do "real" science. Keep it coming with the comedy gold, Thordaddy. And please don't lose those malapropisms, either.
Analytical, Jay M, and I join in opposing the deeply paranoid position of OneSTDV, map, and others who see science as just another corrupted enterprise suject to the same perversions as the media. This paranoia simply does not fit the science we know even today. I admit that the coarsening of American culture and the severe divisions caused by our culture wars politicize science more than ever, but most academic science still remains relatively free of political manipulation.Most scientists are not political fanatics and try to be objective in their pursuit of truth.
The social sciences are where corruption lies. These fields are loaded with Marxists and profoundly delusional NAMS "professors" raging against Whitey daily. Universities themselves are propaganda mills that "orient" new students to the "ultimate goals" of social justice. Furthermore, postmodern philosophy fits perfectly with the anti-scientific thinking of the academic Left. Science is only another subjective narrative!!
The enemies of science are many from the Christian creationists of the Right to the pseudointellectual postmodernists of the Left. Science proper still retains its high standards of objectivity and honesty despite attacks from BOTH Right and Left. These are plague times for us all. When you assert the truth of HBD, remember that great scientists built this biological edifice and the honesty of Henry Harpending, J.F. Crow, etc. keeps this movement alive. The self-correcting mechanisms of science still work today, but the political atmosphere is far more poisonous.It is counterproductive to try to undermine the only institution left that holds the search for truth as the highest endeavor. We need to spread the values of science rather than attempt to undermine them.
Cornelius -
I never said or even implied that science is a corrupt institution like any other. I am saying that science interfacing with government, media, money, etc., is as corruptible as any other institution. Sciences that involve irrelevant topics (like black holes or string theory or other abstract, theoretical topics) are reasonably free from corruption because there is nothing to be gained from corrupting them.
Yet, Cornelius, you insist on using "climate science" or "evolution" or "veganism" as poster children for the scientific method and the incorruptibility of science, when, clearly, these fields are highly compromised.
This blog and others has generated mountains of evidence that the government supports certain scientific ideas not because they are true, but because they attack subgroups of the population that the government hates. Scientists willingly participate in this fraud because they agree with the goals of the government. They are perfectly willing to cloak their frauds within the credibility of science because they share the same ideology as the state.
Why do you find that so hard to believe?
Anon @ 5:13 am
What is doing "real" science? Is it saying, "white man is really making this place hot. In a hundred years we'll be living in hell... According to our models." Lol.
Fool, I already conceded that the scientists have provided a plausible mechanism for a probable outcome. But even this concession isn't ironclad. And it certainly doesn't give us indisputable evidence of what action should be taken.
So white man is heating up his environment. Ok.
Do you have ANY "science" that says what we should do? Do have any "science" that says this is "bad?"
Of course you don't because "science" cannot provide those types of answers.
But what you do have is a lot of supposed disciplined scientists sitting silently while the Al Gores of the planet offer up doomsday scenarios they claim are backed by the "science."
This is the joke that even the ignorant masses can spot.
Cornelius Troost,
When you sever science from God you go from the business of observing an effect and identifying its cause(s) to observing an effect, transforming it into a "cause" and then concocting a future that the rest of us must follow.
If you reject the Created Order as atheist "scientists" undoubtedly do then one can see the genesis of the desire to concoct the future in one's vision.
The negative perception of science and scientists simply falls on the good ones who still hide in obscurity as their more atheistic and politicized peers control the mike.
“don't even get me started on the misinformation spewed about "apolitical" science”
You sounds like creationists railing about "godless" science refuting their theology and making impossible to have "their side" taught in public school science class. The matter has become political, but that's not the fault of science or scientists. Creationism is now being packaged with AGW denialism by the denialists, which proves that both of them are purely political.
“I myself posted, several weeks ago, how climate alarmists proposed an interdisciplinary political/social/scientific push towards marginalizing their foes.”
Of course. When your opposition has spent millions of dollars and two-plus decades on promoting bogus "science", creating the public impression of a scientific "debate" that does not exist among scientists, and otherwise creating a fog of lies about matters that many scientists really believe is a serious threat to society, humanity and the planet (based on their own work, not hearsay), they have no business trying to put together a counter-action against it... according to you.
If you changed a few terms, the political/social/scientific push perfectly describes what Steve Sailer, OneSTDV, Paul Kersey and Unamused are doing to refute the fact-free claims of the blank-slaters and equalitarians. That ought to convince you that you are on the wrong side of this issue.
You should be able to wrap your mind around the idea that the left has some of its facts (if not policies) correct without having your head explode.
What is doing "real" science? Is it saying, "white man is really making this place hot. In a hundred years we'll be blah blah blah... Fool, I already conceded that the scientists have provided a plausible mechanism for blah blah blah....
No, I'd say the fool is he who compulsively strawmans everyone and regurgitates his idée fixe for the ten-thousandth time no matter what the topic really is. The fact that you can't stop yourself from doing this makes it so much funnier than if you were an ordinary troll. You're our pet crank. Dance, monkey, dance!
Analytical -
"Of course. When your opposition has spent millions of dollars and two-plus decades on promoting bogus "science", creating the public impression of a scientific "debate" that does not exist among scientists, and otherwise creating a fog of lies about matters that many scientists really believe is a serious threat to society, humanity and the planet (based on their own work, not hearsay), they have no business trying to put together a counter-action against it... according to you."
This is nonsense. No serious counter argument has been funded by anyone. The global warming promoters have the government on their side; all the major universities; almost every media outlet; Hollywood; the entire primary and secondary school system, etc. Where is this denialist message operating in open competition with pro-global warming message? Nowhere. The denialists are the Emmanuel Goldsteins of our age.
People are rejecting what you AGW'ers are saying because they see what Al Gore and people like him want. They want you to pay $50-a-gallon for gasoline. They want you to freeze in the winter and broil in the summer. They want you to give up your car. They want you to stop eating meat or, better, to go hungry for a few days out of the week. They want you to crowd into tenement apartments or stack multiple families into single family homes.
Proposals like nuclear power or reducing immigration are flat-out rejected by the global warmists because none of these solutions serve the real agenda: to do maximal damage to the modern industrial economy.
People are seeing these climate "scientists" and their promoters for the charlatans they really are. Worse, these scientists are probably funded by foreign powers like China.
Hi, Tragicomic!
"You sounds [sic] like creationists railing about "godless" science refuting their theology and making impossible to have "their side" taught in public school science class."
Nope, sorry. In actuality, I sounds like someone who isnt's goings to lets let you shift the debate to Creationism. You created a "Social Sciences = Leftism/Hard Sciences = Non-Leftism" false dichotomy and got called on it. Now you're chucking out the "icky creationist" bugbear to get yourself out of a tight spot. Instead of crying about Creationism, why not tell me whether or not Barry Bonds could take on Roger Maris? It would be much more relevant.
"they have no business trying to put together a counter-action against it... according to you."
This is one of the dumbest things I've ever read from a Warmist. Some supporters of AGW are, indeed, well-intentioned and disinterested. What chafes is not the attempts to criticize the Anti-Global warming movement. It is the feigned Warm-monger impartiality, the insistence that bias is impossible, and the sweeping statements re: hard sciences not being political because they are hard sciences.
By the way, I've always thought it was criminal, the way they bashed Maris for breaking the record. Yourself?
“No serious counter argument has been funded by anyone.”
Then how did it get all over the radio, newspapers, and everything else? (I'll answer part of that for you. The media's policy of "two sides to every issue" lets cranks get air time and ink even when their positions have no merit. But it doesn't explain how the PhD's got into it.)
The fact you run away from is that organizations like The Heartland Institute, the Cato Institute and the George C. Marshall institute spend millions on AGW denial and have professionally-designed websites devoted to presenting denial arguments in a slick format. They're not scientists. They don't deal in science; they don't fund research or publish peer-reviewed journals. They're all about promoting things that benefit their sources of funds.
“The global warming promoters have the government on their side”
But not enough to get even a small carbon tax through the US Congress. Universities? Shouldn't they be on the side of learning, and thus science? To prove that there's a conspiracy, you have to prove that the science is incorrect (and that the people claiming AGW are in on it). You're not doing that. You're engaging in ad-hominem arguments.
“Where is this denialist message operating in open competition with pro-global warming message? Nowhere.”
I guess Fox News, K Street, and the entire right-wing blogosphere are located in "nowhere".
“People are rejecting what you AGW'ers are saying because they see what Al Gore and people like him want. They want you to pay $50-a-gallon for gasoline. They want you to freeze in the winter and broil in the summer. They want you to give up your car.”
The electric equivalent of a gallon of gasoline costs about 75¢. We can build buildings to stay cool in summer and warm in winter without piles of energy for little or no extra cost; we just don't. The people who oppose cars in general are a fringe of a fringe.
“Proposals like nuclear power or reducing immigration are flat-out rejected by the global warmists”
Patrick Moore (co-founder of Greenpeace), James Lovelock (creator of the Gaia hypothesis), and Mark Lynas have come over to the pro-nuclear camp precisely because it's the only viable way to address AGW.
And there is no such thing as a "warmist". It's a slur, like "teabagger".
“In actuality, I sounds like someone who isnt's goings to lets let you shift the debate to Creationism.”
Unfortunately for you, the creatonuts have shifted the topic already. Second paragraph: “In Kentucky, a bill recently introduced in the Legislature would encourage teachers to discuss “the advantages and disadvantages of scientific theories,” including “evolution, the origins of life, global warming and human cloning.”” Fourth paragraph: “Last year, the Texas Board of Education adopted language requiring that teachers present all sides of the evidence on evolution and global warming.”
Almost all the anti-science cranks are coalescing into one huge blob of stupidity gathered around the Discovery Institute. Only HBD denial is set apart, gravitating to the left.
"Unfortunately for you, the creatonuts have shifted the topic already."
You don't even know my position on evolution, you tool. Congratulations on another pathetic attempt to shift the debate after you beclowned yourself most spectacularly. Are you going to ask me if I believe in transubstantiation next? Or if I'm an Albigensian heretic? To think you represent the Fundie Warm-mongers' A-Game.
"They're all about promoting things that benefit their sources of funds."
Unlike the straight 'n narrow white coated Warmist Fundie priesthood. Go rend your clothes like the High Priest and keep drooling out FoxNewsFoxNewsFoxNews. Blasphemy against warm-mongering mouth breathers? Horrendous, I know.
I hate getting to things this late, but so much needs to be said.
I think that OneSTDV, if he really does reach his conclusions on the basis of facts, needs to consider some highly relevant facts which are currently not in evidence here. These facts concern two things: basic physics, and the sequence of events which led to the current political division regarding the reality (nor not) of anthropogenic climate change (ACC).
First, the physics. CO2 scatters (absorbs and re-radiates) substantial parts of the thermal IR spectrum. If a pure oxy-nitrogen mix is as clear to heat as to visible light, adding CO2 makes it "cloudy" in certain "colors" (the absorption bands). This cloudiness absorbs energy and helps keep it warm from heat radiating up from below; it also helps keep water vapor from condensing and raining out, which amplifies the IR "cloudiness".
The atmosphere thins with altitude, and eventually it gets thin enough that what remains above is not a substantial barrier to radiation to space. This is Earth's equivalent of the Sun's "photosphere", the boundary where energy is no longer bound to the convective gas flow and can radiate freely away. The greater the concentration of CO2 and other greenhouse gases, the higher this boundary and the greater the temperature difference between there and the ground (the temperature typically drops at something called the "lapse rate", which every aircraft pilot learns about in ground school).
This is basic (though hardly simple) physics. If there's a mathematical demonstration that boosting atmospheric CO2 ought to do nothing to Earth's temperature, I've never even heard of it let alone read it. I have read Arrhenius' 1896 paper. The people claiming that ACC is a myth, if they're honest, have a lot of homework left undone.
Second, the sequence of events.
There are a number of memes (narratives) in currency on the US political right which can be tested for validity. For instance, some assert that the USA was founded as a Christian nation. The available facts include the Declaration of Independence and the pamphlets which preceded it (such as Thomas Paine's "Common Sense"), the Federalist Papers and Anti-Federalist Papers, the Constitution and the various drafts and discussion which preceded the ratified document, the same for what became the Bill of Rights (the First Amendment was actually the third to be brought up; the first two on the agenda were not accepted!), and so forth. These do not support the "Christian nation" claim. It's plain fact that "under God" was not added to the Pledge of Allegiance until 1954, during the height of the Cold War. This is a good example of reactionary politics in action. The Soviet Union defined itself as officially atheist, so the USA took the pointless action of adopting some public ritual piety. (This was probably an "own goal", because it alienated non-Christian Americans and may have made them sympathetic to the USSR.)
(too long, continued)
Effing Google is eating the second part of my post over and over, and then demanding verification when I try to post the third part. On top of that, they logged me out and won't let me log back in. Somebody please tell those idiots to back off.
Fifth, Fox News, K Street and the Right-wing blogosphere have done nothing to purge climate science education from the course curriculum. The vast majority of school systems still push this nonsense.
Sixth, you wrote:
“The electric equivalent of a gallon of gasoline costs about 75¢. We can build buildings to stay cool in summer and warm in winter without piles of energy for little or no extra cost; we just don't. The people who oppose cars in general are a fringe of a fringe.”
Hahahahahaha…you mean on the $40,000 Chevy Volt or Prius or Nissan Leaf? With their 50-100 mile ranges? And I guess the buildings all cost 30 times as much as a comparable property using conventional technology.
Seventh, Greenpeace held up the nuclear game for 30 years, hardly paragons of virtue. Their attacks on industrial society should be met with long prison sentences.
Eighth, the “creatonuts” have every reason to oppose your agenda and more power to them for successfully resisting your totalitarian propaganda. Auster is right about the flaws in Darwinism.
Analytical –
Jesus, where do I begin?
First, she media does not have any “two sides to every story” policy. The anti-warming position built organically from skeptics questioning the nonsense spewed by warmists. The media only presents the other side to ridicule it, not to give it a fair hearing in the court of public opinion.
Second, rail all you want about Heartland or Cato or Marshall…these institutions do not have anywhere near the funding of Brookings, Pew or…Harvard. You honestly believe “professionally designed websites” have anywhere near the social capital of the mainstream outlets that global warmists routinely access? You’re really going to compare some shoestring right-wing outfit posting on the internet to the behemoths behind the global warming agenda like Al Gore? Furthermore, your appeals to “science” and “peer-reviewed journals” (which are not really peer-reviewed) amounts to nothing but an appeal to authority argument as logically false as the ad hominem.
Third, the global warming promoters can’t get a carbon tax passed (btw, why are you so focused on carbon taxes? Why the fetish with asceticism?) because no Democrat wants to back an austerity measure on his watch without Republican collusion. This is nothing but the naked self-interest of politicians colliding with their ideology. It is not a weakness in their commitment to push AGW.
Fourth, no, I do not need to prove the science is incorrect to prove there is a conspiracy. All I need to do is demonstrate the disjunction between the claims of certainty of the science and public policy demands the science is making. The warmists sell their science as if everything they do is a controlled, laboratory experiment, the gold standard of the scientific method. It is not. Global warming science is almost entirely statistical in nature, where mathematical models predominate, and where the selection of variables to represent an ecosystem is as much a guessing game as it is a scientific process. Simply put, the level of accuracy of any of these models does not justify the bluster, the demands, and the propaganda that we see in the public policy arena.
Consider an even more fundamental question. Climate science, in essence, is about predicting the weather. When Al Gore lies about hurricanes, floodwaters, and desertification, he is treating climate science as a predictive tool. Yet, despite Gore’s insistence that the science is settled, why doesn’t the climatology profession have any industry presence? Faculties in petroleum engineering and geology constantly rotate between academia and industry. Quantitative finance professors have stints on Wall Street. Yet, not one major agricultural firm has a staff climatologist whose sole job is to predict weather patterns and determine the optimal points for planting and harvesting crops. Don’t you think such a settled science would be especially useful to Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill or even the Koch Industries? What about to Kraft or to Kellogg? What about individual farmers? Have they replaced the Farmer’s Almanac with the latest climate model?
Fifth, Fox News, K Street and the Right-wing blogosphere have done nothing to purge climate science education from the course curriculum. The vast majority of school systems still push this nonsense.
Sixth, you wrote:
“The electric equivalent of a gallon of gasoline costs about 75¢. We can build buildings to stay cool in summer and warm in winter without piles of energy for little or no extra cost; we just don't. The people who oppose cars in general are a fringe of a fringe.”
Hahahahahaha…you mean on the $40,000 Chevy Volt or Prius or Nissan Leaf? With their 50-100 mile ranges? And I guess the buildings all cost 30 times as much as a comparable property using conventional technology.
Seventh, Greenpeace held up the nuclear game for 30 years, hardly paragons of virtue. Their attacks on industrial society should be met with long prison sentences.
Eighth, the “creatonuts” have every reason to oppose your agenda and more power to them for successfully resisting your totalitarian propaganda. Auster is write about the flaws in Darwinism.
(EP here. It looks like Google is not going to let me through on my own account for an indefinite time. I'll have to post the rest of my long comment otherwise and hope it isn't trashed by their crazy filters.)
The meme that "ACC is an anti-USA, anti-industrial civilization leftist conspiracy" can also be tested. It's not enough for it, and the policy measures flowing from it, to be promoted mostly or entirely by the left right now. Several other things must also all be true:
1.) ACC theory would have had to arise out of leftist, anti-industrial thinking.
2.) ACC theory would have had to have been favored largely by people on the political left.
3.) There would have to be little or no physical evidence supporting ACC theory.
Let's take #3 first. NASA and others have already measured an overall temperature anomaly of +0.5°C for the planet as a whole, with this being most evident at the poles here the anomaly is about +2°C. The ACC models predict overall warming, but the strongest effect at the poles at about 4 times the average (heat transport by convection is not affected, but radiation to space is reduced). Other data, like earlier spring thaws across northern regions, melting permafrost across boreal regions, and ice loss from both polar caps (the distintegration of the Larsen ice shelf, which had been stable for tens of thousands of years, is worrisome confirmation) plus Greenland is enough physical evidence to rule out the "no effect" hypothesis. The meme fails #3.
This leaves point #1. Oreskes found scientific analyses of ACC going back more than a century before it became political. My list from Oreskes' talk includes work from these people and panels and the corresponding dates:
1979: the Charney report.
1979: the JASON panel report
1977: the National Research Council report.
1965: the President's Science Advisory Committee
1964: National Academy of Sciences report on inadvertent weather modification.
1957: Han Suess and Roger Revelle.
1950's: Gilbert Plass resolves the IR absorption spectrum of water vapor and proves that it is not overlapping with CO2.
1930's: G.S. Callendar.
1896: Svante Arrhenius calculates that doubling CO2 would raise global temps by 1.5°C to 4.5°C (which he thought was a good thing for his country of Sweden).
1850's: John Tindall establishes "greenhouse" properties of CO2 and water.
The theory had support from (was first quantified by!) people who favored industry, had support from apolitical analysts for decades before today's partisan divide, and has considerable physical evidence to support it. That's 0 for 3; the meme strikes out. (Logically, failing one test disproves the assertion. Flunking all three... epic fail. It really is out there in tinfoil-hat territory.)
(The section on #2 disappeared. Google is being hyper-censorious, and is directing me to login/verification even when I use name/URL. I guess I have to post "anonymous".)
#2 doesn't favor the meme either. Historian Naomi Oreskes researched the subject and found that ACC received considerable attention from non-partisan expert panels in the 1950's through the 1970's. Their conclusions were consistent with today's, but because the problem was not imminent (no policy implications for the next few elections) there was no immediate political impact and no partisan split. Fail again.
(this is the last part, if it gets through.)
The assertion that ending the use of fossil fuels will end industrial civilization is also false. The USA has petroleum reserves equal to a few years to a couple decades of current consumption, and a few decades of economically recoverable coal and natural gas. But the USA is sitting on a uranium inventory equivalent to more than 300 years of current national energy consumption. This is not "reserves";in the ground, this is material in warehouses! The catch is that this requires "fast breeder reactors" to make it accessible. But FBRs are known quantities. They're anathema to US politicos ("environmentalists" on the left, coal interests on the right), but Russia is happy to sell the BN-800 and is set to complete one in China this year. : GE has been wanting to build its S-PRISM for years, held up by costs and delays from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. We can pick one, the other, or both and start right now.
Practically, we need to do this anyway. Fossil fuels (esp. oil) are in limited supply and increasingly difficult and energy-intensive to get. The best and easiest were used first, so what remains is resources of lower quality or hard to get. Since there's nothing easier to get than stuff in a warehouse, and nuclear power is essentially carbon-free, fast-breeder reactors are the one-stop solution to both sides of this issue.
Best, they gore oxen on both sides. All that and political fireworks too; what's not to like?
And a postscript: I hope to use this as the basis for a post at The Ergosphere with a few edits... but that depends on the jerks at Google un-locking my account. Someone really does need to be fired over this fiasco.
Engineer-Poet –
Ok, you are making an argument that is obviously false because you have not considered the basic physics at all.
Think about what you are writing.
The primary source of infrared radiation is sunlight. If CO2 is actually absorbing this IR radiation, then the absorption would occur before any of the IR reached the surface of the planet. Therefore, you cannot have a situation where CO2 is trapping rising IR radiation from the surface if that radiation cannot reach the surface in the first place. This means that, all else being equaled, greater concentrations of atmospheric CO2 should have a cooling effect on global surface temperature as the infrared spectrum of sunlight is blocked.
Now, what about the atmospheric CO2 that is irradiated by the IR sunlight? I’m assuming that other aspects of physics remain in place, like radioactive decay. I am also assuming that infrared radiation has a very short half-life. Therefore, when the earth rotates on its axis and we hit night-time, the atmospheric CO2 dissipates its infrared heat into the surrounding (presumably colder) atmosphere. Thus, cumulative warming into the upper atmosphere is severely curtailed.
None of this even takes into account the fact that CO2 is the primary plant food. More CO2 implies larger and/or more numerous plant life absorbing what is being pumped out. If C02 is being “sunk” then the effect on water vapor condensation is minimized, thus allowing more rainfall, heat, and sunlight which allows for more plant life.
Now we go to the US Constitution, where more confusion needs to be cleared up.
The purpose of the US Constitution and the Declaration of Independence was to correct the abuses of the British Parliament toward the British colonists. The colonists considered themselves to be citizens of the Crown who enjoyed certain rights that were being denied to them, but not denied to other British citizens. Thus, the USC and the DofI was made to make explicit what was before implied.
The Founding was not designed to establish a “blank slate” society. Outside of the governing aspects, America would maintain all of the other elements of British society…including its piety.
Saying the founding fathers never intended to make America a Christian country because no mention of Christianity shows up in the Founding documents is like saying the Founders never intended to make America an English-speaking country because no mention of English appears in the Founding. I'm sure they would've been surprised if anyone brought up the matter.
Engineer-Poet
You wrote:
"The meme that "ACC is an anti-USA, anti-industrial civilization leftist conspiracy" can also be tested. It's not enough for it, and the policy measures flowing from it, to be promoted mostly or entirely by the left right now. Several other things must also all be true"
Uh...this is false.You are saying that, if it looks like a duck, talks like a duck, acts like a duck, and genetically tests like a duck, then it is not a duck.
Please do not do this.
Engineer-Poet:
1.) ACC theory would have had to arise out of leftist, anti-industrial thinking.
False. Leftist thinking regarding ACC theory and anti-industrial attitudes is situational and proximate. One does not need to follow from the other.
2.) ACC theory would have had to have been favored largely by people on the political left.
Again, false. The pedigree of an idea may have no bearing at all on its current expositors.
Eugenics, for example, was not only or always a Nazi philosophy, yet it is still intimately associated with the Nazis.
Engineer poet:
"Let's take #3 first. NASA and others have already measured an overall temperature anomaly of +0.5°C for the planet as a whole, with this being most evident at the poles here the anomaly is about +2°C."
Really? What's the baseline measure for the temperature of the Earth? Where does the data come? With what instrumentation and over what time period?
Keep in mind that none of this established man-made global warming. All that it establishes is that the Earth's temperature fluctuates.
Engineer-poet
"Other data, like earlier spring thaws across northern regions, melting permafrost across boreal regions, and ice loss from both polar caps (the distintegration of the Larsen ice shelf, which had been stable for tens of thousands of years, is worrisome confirmation)"
Again, correlation is not causation. The earth is billions of years old. The Larsen Shelf may very well have a disintegration cycle in the tens of thousands of years.
None of this establishes that it is man-made. Just because we are aware of it occurring does not mean that we are causing it to happen.
Engineer-poet
"The theory had support from (was first quantified by!) people who favored industry, had support from apolitical analysts for decades before today's partisan divide, and has considerable physical evidence to support it."
Actually, your historical listing demonstrates no such thing. Water and CO2 are not man-made substances. They occur in nature. All the older research you cite indicates is that Global Warming and Greenhouse gases are a naturally occurring phenomena.
Among other breathtakingly stupid statements, map just agreed with me that AGW theory predates the left's latching into it, which disproves OneSTDV's claim that AGW is a leftist conspiracy.
I love it when a clown scores an own goal.
"Among other breathtakingly stupid statements, map just agreed with me that AGW theory predates the left's latching into it, which disproves OneSTDV's claim that AGW is a leftist conspiracy."
Back from the hunt for creationists, I see!
In other words, a conspiratorial political movement (progressivism) must, by definition, never be able to co-opt preexisting phenomena (scientific & otherwise) for its own benefit.
Again, the sad thing is that someone this ignorant is the best that warm-mongers can come up with.
In other words, a conspiratorial political movement (progressivism) must, by definition, never be able to co-opt preexisting phenomena (scientific & otherwise) for its own benefit.
Yes, this is obvious. Vegetarianism was originally a product of the 19th century temperance movement, but the left has co-opted in opposition to masculinity and the meat-heavy Western-American diet.
Analytical -
When did I agree that AGW is not a leftist-conspiracy?
The belief in global warming is obviously driven by some sort of hatred of creationists and not on the truth of anything AGWists say.
But, really, I am stunned by some of the things the chicken littles say. Do they not realize that many of the AGW techniques are used in other disciplines and are criticized extensively for all kinds of weaknesses.
Take, for example, Engineer-Poet's historic timeline of AGW research. Does he not realize that the data sets are all generated by different observers using different instrumentation of varying quality?
Nasa's satellite data may be the most accurate, but satellite data is only a three decades old. Worse, satellite quality changes and how much or how little one sees will change. A three-decade old temperature data set is not very useful when you consider the earth is billions of year old.
Even worse, you can't cobble together modern temperature data with data collected 50 years ago off the back of tramp steamer and even pretend that they have anything to do with each other.
I could go on, but isn't this obvious? Economists use many of the same techniques as AGWists, yet no one believes what economists say.
Google claims to have "resolved" the problem they created. I am "me" once more. I'm going to try to break up this rebuttal into smaller pieces to try to avoid hyper-zealous filters and the ridiculously extreme policy measures they trigger.
map, you are not someone who should presume to lecture about physics. I've made an extensive study of the subject, both for my degree and for myself afterwards. It's obvious that you have not.
"The primary source of infrared radiation is sunlight."
Are you under the impression that there is no difference between the IR component of solar radiation (roughly a blackbody spectrum at 5700K) and Earth's surface IR emissions (averaging around 288 K)? You're wrong. The peak of a blackbody spectrum is at a photon energy directly proportional to the absolute temperature. This is available at dozens of sources, but Wikipedia is always a good place to start for physics as physics is verifiable and the cranks get filtered out quickly. The most relevant part is "The function I(ν,T) peaks for hν=2.821439372kT." For solar radiation, this is at about 483 nm in wavelength units, but about 880 nm (near IR) in frequency units. For Earth's thermal IR radiation, this is going to be roughly 20 times longer/lower.
The peak of the solar emission spectrum in wavelength units is in green light (λ=483nm) and frequency units is 880 nm (near IR), where CO2 absorbs little if at all. Earth's emissions are a blackbody spectrum at roughly 15°C (288 K) which is radically different from the solar spectrum. CO2 absorbs almost none of the solar spectrum, but a fair amount of Earth's.
(part 2)
"Therefore, you cannot have a situation where CO2 is trapping rising IR radiation from the surface if that radiation cannot reach the surface in the first place."
That's a grammatically correct sentence, but that's the only way it makes sense. The premise is completely wrong, as is the conclusion. There are many examples which disprove it, so only an ignorant person would make the claim. For instance, Mercury's surface is subject to the direct fury of the Sun's radiation, but the surface of Venus is hotter despite being only dimly lit through its thick blanket of gas and clouds. The difference is that Venus has an atmosphere with a strong greenhouse effect, and Mercury, despite being roughly 70% as far from Sol (and getting ~2x the energy per square meter), is airless.
"This means that, all else being equaled, greater concentrations of atmospheric CO2 should have a cooling effect on global surface temperature as the infrared spectrum of sunlight is blocked."
If this was true, more layers of glass on a greenhouse would make the interior cooler. This is the opposite of observations. You're wrong (actually, worse than that).
(part 3)
"I’m assuming that other aspects of physics remain in place, like radioactive decay."
If you can't treat nuclear phenomena separately from molecular vibrations, you have no business pretending that you understand physics.
"None of this even takes into account the fact that CO2 is the primary plant food."
Not this crap again... CO2 may be the limiting nutrient, or may not. Plants require phosphorus, nitrogen, potassium, CO2 and water. You don't understand the DoI any better than you understand plants.
Water stress can cut plant productivity even if CO2 levels are high. So can temperature. Plants go into photorespiration and can't fix carbon. Productivity goes down and they can die.
As temperatures go up, rice yields go down. About 3 billion people depend on rice for the bulk of their calories. If rice yields start falling, it means mass starvation industrial society or no. And at some point not long thereafter, wheat, corn and grasses meet the same fate. That means us in the West.
(part 4)
Quoth Nine-of-Diamonds:
"In other words, a conspiratorial political movement (progressivism) must, by definition, never be able to co-opt preexisting phenomena (scientific & otherwise) for its own benefit."
That's right, but it doesn't mean what you think it does. OneSTDV chimes in:
"Yes, this is obvious. Vegetarianism was originally a product of the 19th century temperance movement, but the left has co-opted in opposition to masculinity and the meat-heavy Western-American diet."
Yup. But you ignore the fact that the supporting data which argue for vegetarianism (or ACC) are independent of the political uses to which they're currently being put. You have been arguing "the Left has been using ACC to support its agenda, the left is dishonest, therefore ACC is false". This is faulty logic. As Naomi Oreskes documented, the Left did not invent ACC or the concern about it. No matter how wrong the Left is, ACC is not falsified thereby. It stands or falls on physics, not politics. Vegetarianism isn't the best for (many) humans, but details like the health benefits of omega 3 fatty acids vs. omega 6 are salient.
(part 5, final)
map again:
"A three-decade old temperature data set is not very useful when you consider the earth is billions of year old."
You should go learn something about paleoclimate measurement, such as O16/O18 ratios. Here's a primer. Modern isotope ratios have been calibrated against current temperature measurements, allowing prehistoric temperatures to be inferred.
All but the most casual reader here should be able to grasp how totally out of his depth map is when talking physics. Most political pundits are as bad or worse, so their opinions on any related subjects (ACC included) are worth nothing. Listening to them without examining their logic for its errors will literally make you dumber, just like listening to leftists.
Unfortunately, most people find this to be very hard work and won't do it. It's best not to listen to them at all, and read up on the subject starting from first principles. This means getting a good, solid science education. I cannot emphasize this enough.
" You have been arguing "the Left has been using ACC to support its agenda, the left is dishonest, therefore ACC is false". "
You see, this is where GW promoters get themselves into trouble again and again. Analytical's heuristics go something like this: Suspicious of Climate Scientists + HBD Blog = Absolute Disbelief in AGW + Very Evil Creationist + Bunnies!
Aside from the dumb tangent about creationism, note that many skeptics do not deny manmade global warming, so one of your central premises is false. Creating that kind of binary believer/disbeliever moral landscape is off base. Almost as offbase as saying that all climate change proponents retaliate against students (Todd Palmer) or try to block FOIA requests (James Hansen).
Post a Comment