Very interesting 80~minute film on the science and politics of climate change. It decidedly puts forward the sceptical case, that global warming is a real phenomenon but has nothing to do with human activity and CO2, that the Sun is actually responsible for it, that there's a ~conspiracy~ to keep developing countries shitty and dependent and all sorts of other exciting things... I am currently watching part 6 of 8.
Youtube Link:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=u6IPHmJWmDk&mode=related&search=
It was shown on (I think) Channel 4 (UK) last week, and is being shown again on More4 at 22:00, tonight.
How would you know? You never read any of them.
You aren't going to like this, but, despite your ego, you are just a victim of information cascade and you haven't yet had the joy of investigating both sides before making up your own mind.
> You never read any of them.
I've debunked all of them, and you've refused to summarize for others.
> information cascade
I believe what you are trying to say is that people are stupid, and don't know what's best for them. That's capital-f Fascism.
I am not a politik, and have no strong attachment to this debate.
I could even side with you if I wanted, but you'd embarrass me.
How could you have debunked them if you never read them? All you did was whine about the source, rather than consider the information presented. You really are new to this whole debunking thing, aren't you?
> I believe what you are trying to say is that people are stupid
No. I was pointing out a very real and destructive social phenomenon. The more you know about it, the easier it is to avoid falling into that trap.
As to people being stupid; do you know how dumb the average person is? By definition, half the human race is dumber than that.
> There's also plenty of papers that don't.
No, no there aren't. There are a few, here and there. There are far, far more that support it. Even this article which tries to claim otherwise in the face of facts supports this: http://www.dailytech.com/Survey+Less+Than+Half+of+all+Published+Scientists+Endorse+Global+Warming+Theory/article8641.htm
6% deny global warming. From the way it's spun, that is probably an exaggeration, but even if it isn't, that's pretty tiny.
Please explain why this is.
> As to people being stupid; do you know how dumb the average person is? By definition, half the human race is dumber than that.
Technically, that is not true, although it may be approximately true. If you want to take an elitist position about how clever you are, perhaps you should not state that as being true.
Maybe you should look into this radical new concept called a "joke."
"Of 528 total papers on climate change, only 38 (7%) gave an explicit endorsement of the consensus. If one considers "implicit" endorsement (accepting the consensus without explicit statement), the figure rises to 45%. However, while only 32 papers (6%) reject the consensus outright, the largest category (48%) are neutral papers, refusing to either accept or reject the hypothesis. This is no "consensus."
Way to spin it, zippy.
> The more you know about it, the easier it is to avoid falling into that trap.
False.
Explain how that's false, please.
The article came pre-spun. I was merely un-spinning it. The fact remains that only 6% deny the consensus view. The others are supportive or neutral. We had this discussion already, but to recap: In science, you generally don't run around continuously yelling in support of the prevailing theory. It is usually taken as granted unless explicitly stated otherwise.
So once again, why only 6%?
Why did only 7% explicitly endorse it? Why were the other 93% unwilling to come right out and agree?
I already told you. Every paper related to cosmology does not say "Oh and by the way general relativity is true", and neither does every paper about climate science say that AGW is true. It is not necessary to clutter up papers with known facts. When there is a single prevailing theory, there is no need to explicitly mention it all the time, and not mentioning it in no way means you don't believe in it.
If you are attacking the prevailing theory, you do have to mention this explicitly. The situation is not symmetric. And only 6% do, apparently, and even this may be an exaggeration - other studies have found far smaller numbers, but let's go with the largest one here.
Now, why only 6%?
> I already told you. Every paper related to cosmology does not say "Oh and by the way general relativity is true", and neither does every paper about climate science say that AGW is true.
Especially when those writing the paper may not believe AGW is true.
It's going to take some time for me to telepathically reach out to those 6% (and the other 94% just to cover all the bases) and interrogate their brains, so I'll have to wait on that answer until I have read the minds of the authors of all 528 papers in this study. I'll get back to you next week on that.
So basically you have no explanation why most people would not question AGW, yet you will happily claim that anybody who doesn't is stupid?
Don't you ever follow the implications of your own beliefs? Don't you ever question them? Don't you have any kind of skepticism at all?
How the fuck am I supposed to know how other people think? That's metaphysically absurd. Try asking a less stupid question.
If you don't know how people think, why are you so sure they are stupid?
If you know how I think, why don't you tell me?
its their actions and words that determine how stupid they are, not their thoughts. if someone was contemplating a radical new theory for the big bang but wasnt watching where he was walking and fell off a cliff, i would say they were a moron even if they thought at the level of a genius.
Where as I, being less of a judgemental shitbag than you, would have seen that he was merely absent-minded.
I'm just going to ask again: Why are you so quick to pick on perceived inconsistencies of other's arguments, but so blind tho your own? The wise man will always question his own beliefs first - this is the only way to know you have a solid argument before you try and convince someone else. You, on the other hand, are pretty much admitting you don't do that - you claim only stupid people believe in AGW, you claim that all scientists are not stupid, and that many do not believe in AGW, yet when it is pointed out to you that hardly any of them are publishing about this, your only explanation for this is your own ignorance.
It seems pretty clear you have not thought your own beliefs through to the end. I'm just going to make this one final request: Do think them through. Do work out what it is you really believe, and find the real justifications for your beliefs. And then come back to argue your case, when you actually have something to bring to the table. As it stands now, how can you convince anyone else that you are right if you apparently can't convince even yourself?
Okay.
Done now. I'm still right.
How can you know?
Time will bear me out.
So you are basically just taking this on faith?
As much faith as you put in those precious thousands of scientists of yours, yes.
Actually, the thing that sucks about this issue is time won't bear you out, for neither party it seems, although the people pushing for the anthropogenic theory have the momentary advantage. You see, regardless about how huge an impact AGW(Anthopogenic Greenhose Warming) has, the Earth will continue to warm, rather quickly, seeing as we're rapidly coming out of the little ice age. You'll have to wait a few centuries at least before the temperature begins to plunge down again into a deep and long trend of global cooling, which will eventually lead to another major ice age, with huge glaciers and low sea levels, all that jazz.
I'm not sure how factual all of this is, but it makes tremendous sense:
http://mysite.verizon.net/mhieb/WVFossils/ice_ages.html
Can anybody point out some of its flaws if you find any?
Well, the main problem with >>423 is there's no easy way to put interfering leftist busybodies in charge of world affairs. Otherwise, it's pretty sound.
It also offers the heretical idea that we can and should adapt to climate changes, rather than driving our economies into the shitpile in a futile attempt to reduce the global temperature by half a degree or so in the next hundred years.
So now you are calling science "faith"? That's basically at the same level as "proofthatgodexists.com" and religious fanatics.
Give me a single reason to keep listening to you after that.
Well, as for me, the only argument I ever hear come out of the mainstream environmentalists is that the vast majority of the scientific community is in consensus about it. What does that mean? And how is that supposed to convince me? Since when is science about consensus? They never actually try to present what argument-breaking evidence supposedly put them into this consensus in the first place do they?
I've been looking for that evidence but haven't seen it yet.
>>426
cont.
I would listen to Gore's movie, but his theories seem more far-fetched than those about man-made global cooling.
It's full of little misrepresentations, myths, and misleading statements. Generally, it grossly oversimplifies in order to push its own agenda. Try googling keywords from it like "little ice age" to find out more.
Consensus = Appeal to Authority, long known to be the best way to argue a case.
"The science is settled." = a polite demand to stop asking impertinent questions, young man.
"It's complicated." = Don't you worry your pretty little head about it.
You fail reading comprehension yet again. I did not call science "faith." I called your inane and yet reverent belief that Science Can Do No Wrong faith. Your near-constant "Peer Reviewed or it didn't happen" posts indicate a reverent faith in the peer review process, as if it were God Hisself doing the reviewing and not simple, flawed ordinary people.
> Well, as for me, the only argument I ever hear come out of the mainstream environmentalists is that the vast majority of the scientific community is in consensus about it. What does that mean? And how is that supposed to convince me?
It means people who have spent much effort to study the problem all agree that there is a problem. It is supposed to convince you because science is the method we have created to find out the truth about the universe. If scientists were lying to you, that would be a problem far larger than just this issue.
> Since when is science about consensus?
Since is about finding the truth. The truth is the ultimate consensus, no?
> They never actually try to present what argument-breaking evidence supposedly put them into this consensus in the first place do they?
> I've been looking for that evidence but haven't seen it yet.
They present it all the time. That is how science works. The only things that count are what you publish. You are free to learn the methods and study all the published material yourself. It seems that by "looking for that evidence" you mean "waiting for someone to spoon-feed you the information". Go to a university library and start reading the climate science publications if you are really serious about this.
>"The science is settled." = a polite demand to stop asking impertinent questions, young man.
No, "the science is settled" means "you need some actual evidence if you want to challenge this".
> "It's complicated." = Don't you worry your pretty little head about it.
No, "it's complicated" means "it's complicated". You have to actually understand the arguments made before you can attack them.
> You fail reading comprehension yet again. I did not call science "faith." I called your inane and yet reverent belief that Science Can Do No Wrong faith. Your near-constant "Peer Reviewed or it didn't happen" posts indicate a reverent faith in the peer review process, as if it were God Hisself doing the reviewing and not simple, flawed ordinary people.
Yes, peer reviewers are human. Yes, flawed papers sometimes slip through. But for the love of fuck, this is not a paper here and a paper there, it's the majority of published papers we are talking about. If you think peer review is flawed to the level that the majority of published work in an entire field is wrong, you're going to have to come up with an actual explanation for how on Earth such an utter collapse of a trusted institution could happen. You have done nothing of the sort. You are just making vague implications that people are dishonest or stupid, but none of those implications could ever explain the reality of the situation.
And on top of it, you admit you have no idea whatsoever how the situation you claim exists could have happened. You almost seem to be proud of your ignorance of this. Yet you still take the rest of us to task for not believing you, when you can't even give a justification for your own beliefs.
God DAMN you are one naive son of a bitch.
Yes, obviously - believing in science and wanting proof of things before I believe in them makes me horribly naïve. If should be taking things on faith, just like you. And when I can't respond to an argument, I should just ignore it and post some ad hominem attack so I don't have to face up to the fact that I can't support my own beliefs rationally.
You already do plenty of that.
Here's a project for you. Go to co2science.org, and work your way through the subject index. Read stuff at random, but whatever you start reading, read completely. Note the references at the bottom, and if you have a college campus nearby, see if you can look up the original documents and verify what they said in the article is said in the document. Do this for a couple of weeks or so.
Now go to realclimate.org and do the same thing.
Now think about which one looks like its presenting legitimate science, and which one has an agenda to push.
>>434 It's not the believing in science part. It's the absolute faith you have that the majority is always right. Anyone with any knowledge of history knows better than that.
You, in the words of the time cube guy, were educated stupid.
> It's not the believing in science part. It's the absolute faith you have that the majority is always right. Anyone with any knowledge of history knows better than that.
No, I do not have any faith that the majority are always right. What I do have is a belief that the majority of scientists are neither stupid nor dishonest. If you want to claim that they are all wrong, you're going to have to give a solid argument for why they are wrong, and how come they have been able to produce so much research if the basic concept is entirely wrong.
And you've repeatedly said you are unable to do so, so I see no reason to listen to you until you can produce such an argument. Want to try again?
No, "The science is settled." is bullshit. Science should always be considering other possibilities. That's how it's done.
>>437 Then again, why am I wasting time arguing with some anonymous jerk on the internet? Why are YOU wasting time arguing with some anonymous jerk on the internet? Is there a prize if you're annoying enough that he says "Fine, whatever, you win." and leaves?
> What I do have is a belief that the majority of scientists are neither stupid nor dishonest.
If that isn't naive, I don't know what is.
>> What I do have is a belief that the majority of scientists are neither stupid nor dishonest.
> If that isn't naive, I don't know what is.
Once again, we get down to the gist of the argument: It's that everyone is stupider than you, isn't it? As long as global warming is false, and you know this while everyone else doesn't, it means you're the clever one.
Science is always considering other possibilities. It's just that they have to be actually backed up with evidence if they are to be considered. Nobody really claims that "the science is settled" other than those who construct strawman arguments.
>>442 Al Gore did.
>>441 Keep with that persecution complex, it'll serve you well in the real world.
Ok, I think we have long since reached the point in this thread where nothing new is being said, and the thing is just going out of stubbornness. It has very little to do with any kind of actual science, and anything worth saying has been said.
Nobody wants to read this mess any longer, so this thread, and this discussion, is now closed. Don't try to start up the exact same thing again in a new thread. If you absolutely, positively, have to bring up the subject, make sure you are brining something genuinely new and interesting to the table, or else that will get nuked too.