Slashdot Mirror
Heartland Institute Learning To Troll On Billboards
Fluffeh writes "The Heartland Institute is a lovely group of folks who take issue with mainstream climate science. They organize an annual get-together of like minded folk and talk trash about environmental change. 'The people who still believe in man-made global warming are mostly on the radical fringe of society.' (That's from a press release!). Recently, when they were tricked by a researcher into sending him a lot of internal documents, they decided to go on the offensive and also get some more media attention. After all, any story is a good story, right? Launching a billboard with the Unabomber on it with the slogan 'I still believe in Global Warming. Do You?' was just the start, with the institute planning Fidel Castro, Charles Manson and possibly even Osama Bin Laden. That's when even their stout backers threatened to walk away, backing started to dry up — and it seems that common sense started to prevail — but only so far as to stop them from making their message too public."
Shills for the oil industry.
Fidel Castro, Charles Manson and possibly even Osama Bin Laden
Wow, I never knew that Ted Kaczynski and the above crew were quoted on Global Warming. So, upon reading the article I found that:
How did Heartland justify the comparison between murderers and tyrants and anyone who believed in global warming? "Because what these murderers and madmen have said differs very little from what spokespersons for the United Nations, journalists for the 'mainstream' media, and liberal politicians say about global warming," according to the press release that announced the ads. It went on to claim that "[t]he people who still believe in man-made global warming are mostly on the radical fringe of society."
Wait, so you're telling me that you're putting pictures of some of recent history's most hated and feared men next to quotes about believing in Global Warming?
Congratulations, Heartland Institute, your argument is now so depraved that you've reduced yourselves to holding up pictures of Hitler in a public forum while pantomiming your opponents. Is that reductio ad ridiculum or is this so childish that people didn't even bother coming up with a Latin phrase for it?
So they won't mind if I put up a billboard that reads
"... and when this Earth is fucked
the free market will build us a better one."
(read more at www.heartland.org)
My work here is dung.
I've got a nutjob pastor down the street who has his flock sending kids to kindergarten wearing T-shirts saying "Islam is of the Devil," and burning, or threatening to burn Korans at every drop of a hat. The mainstream media made the mistake of giving him a lot of attention once, they're getting wise now, he's starting to shout into a vacuum.
I dare bet the unabomber, Castro, Manson and Bin Laden all believe(d) in breathing air as well.
Does that make breathing air wrong all of a sudden?
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
...giving them free publicity, meaning their "crazy pill" strategy to garner attention worked.
Well done, Slashdot!
Last I knew, it was still heavily debated exactly how much of an effect humans have had on global warming compared to natural causes (IE: volcanic eruptions). Does it have an effect? Sure. Does it have a noticeable effect? Probably. Does it have a significant effect? Maybe. There's way too many variables to really be sure if humans are speeding up natural global warming by a significant amount (IE: accelerating it from millennia to centuries or centuries to decades). Not to say that these nutjobs aren't nutjobs, just that they're comment about "man-made" global warming bares some semblance to reality.
... Fidel Castro hates cancer, so you must love it, or you'll be agreeing with him. Ergo you love cancer.
The reason the backers backed away is because it shows they had no rational argument to the science of climate change. If this was the best argument they could do, then they have nothing.
The word "denier" implies the debate is over. So why not do what the Heartland Institute is doing? Smear the shit out of the AGW believers. It's how campaigns are won, and this one is being won.
How can you even argue that they should be doing anything different, if you assume that they actually believe in what they believe in. The other side is working off of false premises and has been admitting it - not quite openly, but admitting it - for 30 years. All that talk about the emergency not allowing for proper proof. Why not go hardball in the other direction? It's the only thing that's worked so far to move the needle. Otherwise, every time there's a snowstorm or a heat wave, it's AGW causing it.
Did you really think that politicians, an expression of the will of people, were going to let what amounts to a bunch of geeks tell them what to do? Think about it for a moment and realize how ludicrous that sounds. Of course there are Climategates and OBL billboards going up, tarring the AGW believers. This is standard politics, how it's been done since the beginning of time.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
WTF, just WTF. The extreme right are getting to be one of the major nutjob groups on the planet. They make the other nutjobs around the world seem almost sensible in comparison.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
How is this in any way different from the continual use of the "denier" word by the green-shirts?
The owners of coal powered plants are similar to the operators of the death-trains of the Nazis (by James Hansen).
Some recent greenshirt columnist thought that those that disagree with his beliefs should have their house burnt down.
All in all you reap what you sow.
Left-wingers act like they are taking part in a justified war.
And a war is what they receive, by someone who considers themselves equally justified.
They're going about it the wrong way.
You don't want people asking themselves why they care whether the Unabomber believed in AGW.
You want them asking the right questions:
1. Is the planet warming?
2. If yes, by a significant amount?
3. If yes, is it human caused?
4. If yes, by a significant amount? (say >=30%)
5. If yes, can we reverse it?
6. If yes, should we reverse it?
7. If yes, do the risks of not reversing it outweigh:
- taxing your breath
- crippling the world economy
- billions of people poorer, governments richer
- any and all other power grabs and loss of freedom that result
8. If yes, what are the chances we'll make it worse by trying to fix it?
There is a lot of doubt added for each of 1-6 (especially if you're a good scientist/engineer with healthy skepticism), enough that there's not good reason for any politician to even look at #7.
Only 1-5 are actually science/engineering. The rest are political questions.
Anti-AGW people like myself just like to point out that there is uncertainty in 1-6, and even if there wasn't, the answer to #7 is most certainly "NO".
And for #8, here I cite the Aral Sea, the tire reef, solyndra, and the recent article about wind turbines causing warming as examples of wonderful government environmental "successes".
P.S. If you're taking 1-6 as truth with zero doubt, you've got a religion.
Last I knew, it was still heavily debated exactly how much of an effect humans have had on global warming compared to natural causes (IE: volcanic eruptions).
Well, according to the USGS man made CO2 levels for 2010 were 35 billion metric tons while all volcanic activity was estimated at 0.26 billion metric tons. So keep spreading your lies and uncertainty about climate science. Your cheap rhetoric designed to protect your lifestyle is surprisingly effective against individuals who spend their lives studying this stuff and publishing in peer reviewed journals, NASA, etc.
Does it have an effect? Sure. Does it have a noticeable effect? Probably. Does it have a significant effect? Maybe. There's way too many variables to really be sure if humans are speeding up natural global warming by a significant amount (IE: accelerating it from millennia to centuries or centuries to decades).
All that bullshit peppered with weasel words like "probably" and "maybe" without a single citation. Well done. The concensus from the scientific community has been made, the burden of proof is now on you to refute their findings. Not vice versa. Not "probably" or "maybe."
My work here is dung.
Incidentally, I've heard that the late Mr. Bin Laden was a big enthusiast of the right to keep and bear arms...
This story needs some serious editing.
I am lying ...
Another opportunity for Slashdotters to pity themselves for their victimization at the hands of a global scientific conspiracy. "We've been labeled deniers," the Slashdotters will lament, "it's ad hominem!"
"In our view, these billboards just return the favor. It's how politics, I mean science and peer review, works! It's hard ball, and climate-change-anistas are big bully crybabies!"
Indeed, it's reminiscent of how Copernicus, in his deep resentment of the Catholic church, formed the idea that the Earth revolves around the Sun and then set about finding evidence of his pre-determined conclusion, labeling those who disagreed "deniers," and proceeded to build "scientific consensus" by using his position to deny grant money and publication to sensible, honest researchers!
is that it makes the lunatic fringe much easier to locate.
And now I'm going over to the Daily Kos to get my morning tech news.
If you have a society where the people with a clue are not in a position to tell those in power what to do you end up with basket cases like Maoist China, early USSR or Taliban run Afganistan. Your resident buddy horse judge or a Sentator's catamite is not going to do as good a job as somebody with a lifetime in emergency services for example, and if they refuse to listen to those that do you get disasters turning into catastropies that could have been bettter handled by under-resourced third world agencies.
Exxon mobile, funded a lot of climate denial. They had to *PAY* to get the *DENIAL*, as a bought and paid service.
http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/news-and-blogs/campaign-blog/revealed-exxon-secret-funding-of-global-warmi/blog/25605/
Even they gave up on this:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/09/AR2007020902081.html
This is an oil company paying people to convince them to use more oil, even as it's creating CO2 that leads to global warming. Even they gave up this pseudo science. Even they stopped pretending it wasn't man made.
It's an indication of failure that they did the billboard. Because it was weak. When pseudo scientists were claiming the warming was the result of heat islands expanding to cover where the temperature measurements were taken, that had a ring of plausibilty about it (well until large area satellite analysis showed it was false anyway). But when they started with the "Bobo the clown thinks global warming is real, are you a clown too", which is the thrust of this advert, then it showed they'd accepted the basic science because they hadn't an answer to it.
I always think I've won and argument when the opposition is reduced to insults, and that's happened here.
article with references to NASA and NOAA data
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/05/global_warming_melts_away.html
As Jon Stewart pointed out last night: Hitler believed an international banking conspiracy threatened to destroy Europe. Today there's an internal banking conspiracy threatening to destroy Europe ... and it's led by the Germans!
Heartland believes there's a conspiracy to falsify science threatening to destroy civilisation as we know it. Today Heartland's conspiracy to falsify science is threatening to destroy civilisation as we know it.
Oh the irony?!
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
The only reason they're trolling is to get some widespread attention. Regardless of the ethics, it works. People are going to see this story, go to their website, read some posts and be influenced by their message.
Usually, trolls get down-voted to (-1 Troll). In this case, however, they made the front page. Not sure how that one worked out.....
No man is an island, But if you take a bunch of dead guys and tie them together, they make a pretty good raft.
To be fair, if this is Heartland's attempt at trolling, they need to visit 4chan or Mumsnet to see how it's done. Making billboards that could conceivably be attributed to the mentally handicapped is not trolling. In answer to the Futurama image macro (seriously, not been oblig'd yet?) they are not trolling, they're just dumb.
Luckily Slashdot is prepared for anti-global warming trollers with a whole army of anti-anti-global warming trollers! And we can throw in a few anti-DMCA freedom fighters too.
http://www.beanleafpress.com
1. You don't speak for the right wing, only a fringe on the right wing is in denial about this. Fox New BTW has fewer viewers than the Daily Show, it's become such a niche.
2. You used the word 'war', they used the word 'warming'. Your attempt to exaggerate the rhetoric is misleading and pointless.
If you have coherent arguments that explain the warming trend and CO2 trends and the science linking the two please put forward your argument.
Is it that even the crazy people accept global warming, so you should too? Or that you would have to be even more crazy than these people to reject it?
I hope they didn't pay a lot to the advertising agency that came up with this campaign.
now, who's the most radical idiots?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1317079/Richard-Curtis-exploding-schoolchildren-climate-change-video-withdrawn.html
I bet they all believe in the Theory of Gravity & use dihydrogen monoxide on a regular basis as well!
There is a war going on for your mind.
That is trolling. I hate the GW issue in general because it's so political.
But indifferent to that, the heatland institute shouldn't have done that.
I mean... I'm sure you can find a pedophile that likes kittens and then make a billboard that says "so and so likes kittens... do you?"...
There are perfectly reasonable ways to make these arguments without resorting to these tactics.
The pro GW factions have legitmately taken some body blows with the IPCC apparently not doing a very good job with the science, the universities and scientists apparently having some elitist ideas about what the public should and shouldn't know... and of course the "everything is caused by GW" meme being disproven abotu as often as it's claimed. The polar bear line was recently disproven in that the polar bears are apparently fine and the whole basis for claiming they were in trouble was specious. The scientist that proposed the notion is either under investigation or was disaplined in some fashion for creating the media circus.
And of course the anti GW groups likewise take a beating on a regular basis because the world does appear to have warmed about 1 degree over the last 100 years and that is very worrying trend. And of course the oil companies keep funding counter studies not unlike the pro smoking studies done in 50s and 60s. So it's very worrying that such biased groups might be influencing the science.
Long story short, it's impossible to trust anyone and it's a big political circus.
This sort of ad doesn't make it better. It makes it worse.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
So long as the politicians keep trying to use climate change theory to shove new taxes, regulations, and laws down people's throats, people are going to defend themselves by whatever means they can, including trying to discredit the science in the first place.
Keep the state out of science, just like we learned to do with religion centuries ago, and people will stop trying to corrupt science.
Liberty in your lifetime
It was also once consensus that the Earth was the center of the universe.
But it wasn't published in peer reviewed journals. I dare say at the time there was no "scientific community" and that nationality determined which intellectual circles you could run in. Although I do agree that, to compare the state of where we are today, you would need to go back to pre-Renaissance times.
A consensus of people in some places think it's okay to stone adulterers.
Yeah, a consensus of people who were not scientists. Who were not using statistics or science at all ... who were basically calling themselves judge, jury and executioner. Again, what these strange archaic Puritanical concepts have to do with modern scientific consensus is well beyond me. I link you 18 scientific associations' assertions on global warming and you refute it with some ancient lynching. Apples to oranges.
Just because a majority of people believe something is true doesn't mean that it is.
It's really weird that when the top minds of physics postulate that black holes exist, we're not adverse to it. But when the top minds of climate science agree on something, suddenly we are the armchair scientists who are better than those who have studied this most of their lives and have compiled samples from decades past from around the world. And the key difference seems to be that you don't want to face the consequences. You're okay with no longer using CFCs, you're okay with trying to wrap our minds around the existence of black holes and could you tell me why now you choose to shove your fingers in your ears and scream "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU."
You can point out factual errors in another's post without going down the road of "cheap rhetoric" and "buillshit" in your own.
This befuddles me the most. The original post I replied to said:
Last I knew, it was still heavily debated exactly how much of an effect humans have had on global warming compared to natural causes (IE: volcanic eruptions).
So I provide a citation and hard numbers on man-made CO2 versus volcanoes. And you label that "cheap rhetoric" and "buillshit"?
The Cherry Blossom festival happened sooner than ever in its history this year in DC and NASA says it's not just cherry blossoms but all plants (published in Nature's May 2nd issue, a peer-reviewed journal). Of course, this natural basic indicator of the state of the climate doesn't have an immediate perceived threat to mankind's existence so you're free to keep your fingers in your ears. At some point though, it's going to become annoying, then problematic for third world countries, then it will slowly climb the chain up to the protected Americans. And then, and only then, will we be willing to do something about it. When it's too late.
My work here is dung.
This post is as misleading as the Billboard. In context, the press release argues that the scientific process has been severely compromised in regards to climate research, something that has been documented and lamented by professional scientists everywhere. The most recent example is the father of Green science in Germany, Fritz Vahrenholt, whose new book takes the IPCC apart (http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2012/02/14/a-top-german-environmentalist-cools-on-global-warming/). This is just one example, mind you.
Then your link to an unnamed "researcher" who illegally obtained documents from Heartland is deeply misleading as well. First the documents reveal nothing as damning as the Climategate emails did. Second, the "researcher", Peter Gleick, has apologized and resigned from the American Geophysical Union (http://www.agu.org/news/press/pr_archives/2012/2012-11.shtml ).
The Billboard is making an association that is illogical and stupid. Evil and stupid people can believe things that are true- they do it all the time. This post is not much better with its decontextualized quote and reference to a shamed unnamed scientist.
Finally, there is no mainstream position anymore on Climate Change. The skeptics have gained acceptance and their arguments are being heard. Let's stop politicizing science and let the professionals work it out.
Go ahead... bury your head in the sand. Only then will we truly see that a bunch or buttheads you are.
"We are just a war away from Amerikastan. When god vs god the undoing of man." Dave Mustaine
Zero explanation. Yet skeptics are the radicals.
No thanks! I'll get my no-spin news from the old reliable Washington Post, NY Times, MSNBC, Huffington Post and the Daily Kos. Yep, that'll do me.. now where did I put my tinfoil hat?
"even your link shows NO WARMING for the LAST DECADE"
Yes it does, it shows a clear trend upwards. I can't believe it's already a whole degree celsius up, but yet that's measured data.
You seem to be hoping that people won't click his link and see the data for themselves, instead just reading your comment and taking your interpretation of the data, but that's just silly.
and putting more money into fusion. There, didn't tax your breath or cripple the economy. Just put the money somewhere different. Wonk wonk wonk on the rest of your list: that stuff happens all the time.
http://rps3.com/Files/AGW/EngrCritique.AGW-Science.v4.3.pdf
You know who else used propaganda to demonize his enemies? Hitler!
Shills for the oil industry.
Well, they are funded by the fossil fuel industry (not just oil; that includes coal), or by billionaires whose money comes from in the oil industry. (For this campaign, anyway; they also work on other issues.) Whether this makes them "shills" is a value judgement.
What we learn the billboard, however, is simply this: the Heartland Institute is a policy advocacy organization, not a science institute. They are no longer even pretending to have any interest in actual science. Their only interest in science is to attack it in order to make policy points.
They have stated this before-- Joseph Bast, the president of Heartland, stated that the Heartland Institute's focus is "commitment to a free market policy agenda," and that the main motivation for the Heartland Institute being involved in this debate is to "prevent the U.S. government from adopting policies that favor renewable energy," which he claims would cause an "economic disaster for the country."
But, despite clear statements that their agenda is related to policy, not science, people have been taking their attacks on science seriously.
Some links:
http://rockblogs.psu.edu/climate/2012/01/ethical-analysis-of-the-climate-change-disinformation-campaign-introduction-to-a-series.html
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201107070016
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
By all accounts, "its too late to stop AGW" -- it can be slowed a few decades by implementing drastic, techno-economic killing solutions. (Reduce consumption of power, transportation, A/C, etc. Essentially spend trillions with the advance knowledge that a small decrease in CO2 output won't do squat. )
Unless Slashdot writes about a technological breakthrough that can truly make a difference, such as Defkalion's LENR, it doesn't really fit in with the theme of News for Nerds.
One thing I'd like to know is this: for the last few decades there's been a concerted campaign to make conservatives distrustful of science....
So here's what I want to know:
1. Why? Why target conservatives specifically with anti-science propaganda? Why aren't liberals being targeted too? (Arguments like "Conservatives are more gullible" will be ignored for obvious reasons.)
This is an interesting thing that I've noticed. It's a very significant change from the world I grew up in, where liberals were classically distrustful of science, and conservatives very much pro-science. Through the Reagan era, being pro-science was associated with conservatism, but somehow after the end of the Reagan era, the conservative movement made a sharp turn away from science.
My hypothesis is that it comes from the conservative politicians discovering in the 90s that they can tap into the power of religious fundamentalists. The fundamentalists came with an anti-science agenda and distrust of science, preferring belief-based reasoning in the form of their advocacy of creationism, and have spent decades fine-tuning their anti-science arguments that they have been using in the war against evolution. The mainline conservatives seem to have picked up their specific arguments, without even explicitly recognizing the overall tenor of them as being anti-science.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Goes on to show their hypocrisy. If they are going to mention Castro, how about mentioning American backed terrorists? Castro did not blew a Jet Liner, Posada Carriles living happily in Florida did (and confessed it). He is also responsible of planting bombs in Cuba and central America, killing an Italian tourist in the process. He is protected by the US gov. over a CIA pact for doing anti-communism dirty jobs.
Yes, the USA is infringing their own counter-terrorism UN resolutions by protecting the likes of him (and Orlando Bosch among others, sentenced in US soil but quickly pardoned by Bush father), also living happily directing the nice Cuban lobbyists...
Artix
Your Linux, your init.
Anti-AGW people like myself just like to point out that there is uncertainty in 1-6, and even if there wasn't, the answer to #7 is most certainly "NO".
That is a risk management question, and the average /professional doctor/ is not qualified to do risk management on their patients, because they are no appropriately trained. But since you are moving from conclusions back to arguments, I am sure you fill in "me == expert-in-risk-management" somewhere in the cognitive malaise.
This is highly speculative is not against AGW. Doesn't even hint at attacking any of the main well established scientific arguments regarding current warming. How many times to "skeptics" throw studies at me, and then you read them, and wonder what they are smoking.
In the Barry Goldwater era conservatives supported research. For decades conservatives talked about objective reality while academics played with deconstructionism and "different ways of knowing".
At a guess, it's the nature of the issues today. If science had proven that civil rights laws caused cancer, then liberals would be prey to anti-science propaganda.
They reach over and try to yank the shorts off liberals and scream "Look they don't have pants on either!"
RW proponents argue that liberals do the same thing, decry lack of "balance" and impariality...the RW defenders shift focus away from the original post exposing the lies.
I've seen and heard the same backpedaling weasley douchbaggery over and over again. The fact is the Heritage Foundation is a FUD maker. Bought and paid for by assholes who want to preseve the "Wealthy American" way of life for themselves.
"You have to apply the same rules to both sides if you are truly understand the answers to you questions Frankly, neither should be trusted.....Fraud has been proven on both sides. "
What to do about it is a political question. "Roll with the punches" is an option. "Industrial growth will do more for human welfare than climate stabilization" is an option. Both are "conservative" in the sense of not changing things. Why don't conservatives fight on the battlefield of policy, not science?
Not to mention that conservatism includes harm avoidance and a cautious approach to experimentation, so that if there's even a small chance that our current uncontrolled experiment with CO2 could cause harm, conservatives should be against continuing it.
Today Heartland's conspiracy to falsify science is threatening to destroy civilisation as we know it.
How? Even if you grant fully the research supporting AGW (Heartland's primary target), there's no civilization-threatening problem out there.
Heartland is making an argument against proposed policy responses to global warming by attacking the science. Their attack is to support and amplify the voices of critics who are shouting out assertions that scientists are liars, con men, hoaxers, crooks, and frauds.
If the "I-don't-believe-in the-greenhouse-effect" crowd were merely saying "climate scientists are well intentioned, but are misinterpreting key data that shows we should hesitate before drawing conclusions," that would be a different thing. But the attack is using phrases like "criminals" and "corrupt" and "conspiracy to defaud the public" and "should be put in jail."
Since our society is based on science, yes, I'd say that a campaign to instill the attitude that science is fraudulent and scientists are liars and should be put in jail is an attack on civilization as we know it.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Whether it's on a billboard or a scientific conference.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
For fun, let's look at #7 (even though it was already answered by #6 -- if we should reverse it, the risks of not reversing it are too big, apparently.) :)
- Crippling the world economy
That's a nice change from a group of w/bankers doing that
- Billions of people poorer, governments richer
Dunno if you noticed, but the trend is for people to get richer. Compare your spending power with 50s spending power. Compare Chinese/Indian/Brazilian/.. spending power with their 50s equivalent. Sure, there are bumps on the way, but we've been steadily going up.
- any and all other power grabs
Is that an argument against doing something against global warming or against doing anything, whatsoever?
Now let's look at the consequences of not reversing (remember, we're at #7, so we already decided we should reverse it).
- we're ruining our only real deep-space space ship (Earth).
- we're substantially changing living conditions on the only habitable planet we can get to
- we're messing up all of the planet's eco-systems
Here's the thing. Even if this all happens at a glacial pace (which, experts agree on, it is not), and even if it won't affect you, your children, your grandchildren, or even their grandchildren. Even if the effects will only become significant in 500 years.
You. Are. Still. Fucking. Up. Our. Only. Planet.
The question is not "how can I try to ignore that and reason it away?". The question is not "does it marginally affect the spending power of a tiny blip of all humans who will have to live with the result?" The question is "How can we make this place better?"
Although I am not a "denier", I do understand the source of their distrust of mainstream climate science.
For a while, climate scientists were predicting a new ice age. Then, a few years later, they changed their tune and started predicting a heat wave.
That 180-degree change has been very poorly explained to the public. As a result, everyone has to imagine for themselves what the explanation might be. Maybe it's:
1. "They were working with bad data back then. We've got better data now, I promise."
2. "They were really bad at making predictions back then. We're got much better judgement now, I promise."
3. "They were infiltrated by a culture of pseudo-science. That's all been eliminated now, I promise."
Today's climate scientists are implicitly discrediting yesterday's scientists. That makes the entire profession look bad. And it raises the question: are we SURE that all the flakes and nuts are really gone?
And that's were we are today: with some very reasonable people wondering if all the flakes and nuts are gone.
And given all the drama, it's clear that the internal power struggles are still continuing. With all that distraction, it's hard to believe the science is operating at its best.
I believe that climate science is being hurt by their failure to address these question openly and honestly. Until they do, the deniers will always have an easy way to introduce doubt.
hey all. i know /.ers love science and all and i love it too, i care about my environment but i can't help but feel some kind of connection with these AGW nuts because i have some nagging suspicion that the environmental movement could be the tip of a slippery slope towards more hardline depopulation movements targeted at the developing world (a place where i live, have family and hope to bring children into one day). sort of the same way early racist biology & social darwinism lead to eugenics... against you know, brown folks like me, i can't help but be sensitive to what i'm reading as the same sort of scientific/moral imperative to make the world "a better place"... maybe we're smarter now than we use to be and won't fall into the same academic insensitivity, but you know, even eugenics was a road to hell paved with good intentions.
on a more base level i'm afraid that ill be bringing a kid into this world that won't have the luxury of resources we enjoy to pursue knowledge or have the free time to talk to other people about issues like this because stronger powers today decided that "the (hydrocarbon) party was over" just when they were leaving it- and now as many younger (demographics-wise) asian countries start coming of age i hope there isn't some future red-scare-resource-greenhouse-cold war type-axis-of-polluters stigma that gets cultivated in the morass of the AGW debate that begins to infect foreign policy on an international scale... i can only hope for the least-worst outcome of that screwed up future... maybe we'll really just have no choice because the situation will really BE that shit and it would be politically manufactured... ergh
perhaps this has been brought up before and the person that brought it up got the intelligent, respectable beatdown one gets when engaging /.er's uncanny logical prowess... but can anyone administer a similar beating? then allay any whatever (ignorant?) fear that I have towards the environmentalists that live in a country with more nuclear weapons and destroyer class naval vessels than any other country? thanks.
All these political posts on Slashdot disguised as news stories are really pissing me off. Slashdot, you're about to lose me, and I've been around since the late 90's. STOP FOR FUCK SAKE!
Curious to know what well funded entities are paying money to people to have them make up stuff that would encourage people to want "Big Government".
The insurance industries got Obamacare.
The LARGE banks all got huge bailouts.
The Unions got to avoid any cuts whatsoever with GM being bought by the feds.
BP donated a huge amount of money to Oabma so they could play fast and loose with regulations around offshore drilling.
Look around you fool. EVERY giant corporation wants big government, because they can play regulations against smaller companies that would otherwise threaten complete domination. There is no shortage of vast sums dedicated to propping up every larger expanses of government as a firewall between what they want to do and the desire of the people.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Don't look up actual studies on global warming produced by any reputable organization on the planet.
Go about your business and pretend it isn't happening.
Sheep.
Why wasn't the science good enough for him?
Institutionalised anti-science groups foisting policies the directly conflict with something as important and well researched as the pentagon's annual threat assesments upset most scientists and skeptics in the same way as shoplifting upsets shopkeepers. In my book deniers are intellectually dishonest people who cannot be swayed by reason and evidence, the exact opposite of what it means to be a skeptic or a scientist. Yes, it really is THAT simple, some people still live and die by their principles other's sell them for whatever they can get. No grand conspiracies, no scientists living the highlife on the taxpayer's dime, no NWO, no reputable journals playing the role of Pope Urban VIII. Just a loose group of 50-odd "think-tanks" all headquareted within a mile of K-street and all selling the same (surprisingly cheap) product - tailor made anti-science propoganda and face to face access to the likes of senator Inhofe.
I can understand why honest, descent people sacrafice things to try and shut these morally bankrupt institutions down, especially when 'the people' are supporting their FUD factories via a tax free charity status. What I can't understand is how easily their obvious propoganda convinces literally millions of otherwise intelligent people that someone like Lord Monckton is anything but batshit insane and/or a compulsive liar for hire.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
People who support radical change have hijacked the word "conservative" just as those who support extremism in religion have hijacked the word "Christian."
Many, perhaps most, of the engineers and scientists I know are instinctively conservative. They want to build on the past, not toss it out. As Edmund Burke wrote, they have the disposition to preserve but the ability to improve.
True conservatives also want to conserve the earth; it is no accident that the word is closely related to "conservation." And when science comes in conflict with religion or traditional belief, the first instinct of conservatives is to defend the old order, but after science prevails, as it did by 1926 in the matter of evolution, conservatives defend the new "old order." They do not seek to return the 21st century to the time of the robber barons of the 1800s.
The problem is that true conservatives--the ordinary people you live and work with--have allowed extremists like Limbaugh run the so-called conservative agenda because they see these loudmouthed firebrands as helping them hold back too-rapid change. In this, they resemble the Junker class in Germany that despised Hitler but supported him because they thought that he and his own brand of firebrands would hold back socialism.
If the stranglehold that extremists have on today's U.S. Republican Party is ever to be broken, it must be broken by true conservatives in the tradition of Burke, Churchill, Eisenhower, and the first President Bush. Until that is done, they have no real choice except to stay home or vote for the Democrats.
In all honesty, I don't get all this AGW/Non-AGW racket. Is this an US thing?
AGW by caused by humans using fossil fuels for cooking, heating and driving their cars does sound resonable to me. But even if details need to be debated, I personally do not need any further hypothesis about how and in what speed AGW is going to come into effect. I believe it allready has, but that's just belief.
What I *do* know however is this:
1) We have 7,2 Billion people on this planet, the number is growing and the growth rate is increasing.
2) Most of these people heat and cook with fossil fuels. This is a problem that would be next to trivial to solve, somewhat in the way the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is giving toilets to a bazillion people and doctors going around asking the villagers in 3rd world countries to store their drinking water in PET Bottles on the roof in the sun for three days as to eliminate 99,999% of all patogens in it before drinking it. Along that alley solar cookers and basic tips on isolation could case simular changes on a huge scale in the 'fossil fuel wasting dept. - and people would be glad not having to scavange for wood or burn poisinous plastics. And even if it only is to improve local climate and save some woodlands. That's a reason more than good enough - AGW one way or the other.
3) Germans spend 4.7 Billion man-hours per year in traffic jams. 4 point 7 fucking Billion man-hours per year! Sorry folks, I do not know about you, but I do not need any more info on AGW or cartraffic CO2 output in Germany to know that that number adds an entire new level to 'insane' and it would be best for all Germans and their quality of living to invest 20 - 40 Billion Euros in further ICEs even better public transport and - if we so desire (i think'd be tres cool) - a Transrapid (German Maglev) loop throughout the republik. Quality of life would get another boost, Germans would have time to have kids again and we could quit subsidizing cartraffic via tax-breaks (yeah, some real shit going on in that dept. over here ... don't even get me started) and we could quit plastering our already scarce untouched countrysides with more 6-track Autobahnen.
Bottom line: This AGW/Non-AGW racket is a silly roadshow to distract from clear issues at hand that need no scientific debate to be recongised as problems that need solving. Now. But I guess officials just want a heated debate to happen and nothing to be done. It's called Mass Distraction.
My 2 cents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
heartland institute was created to secretly teach us all about logical fallacies.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The main selling point of HRI in particular and the Right Wing in general is this: You and your family don't have to ever change your lifestyle or even think about the devastating environmental, financial, or human rights effects of said lifestyle.
Even on a subconscious level, being absolved of ones' sins is very alluring. Praise Jesus and turn up the A/C!!
If they use the images of people who are still alive, and may object to inaccurate representations of their beliefs, to discredit AGW, aren't they setting themselves up for a libel lawsuit?
The problem is people like you who claim "The science is settled". The science is never settled, stop using this false claim to shut down opposition. If the science was so concrete, their predictions would have come true. But the sea levels aren't rising anywhere near as fast as they originally claimed. The temperature hasn't risen nearly as much as they claimed it would. And next year is the year they predicted for the Arctic to be ice free, and I doubt that one's coming true either. Therefore, they got something wrong. So go back, study some more, examine some more, find the mistakes, and try again. But don't tell me the "science is settled" and demand I pay double the current rate for electricity when all of your predictions about what will happen are turning out false.
They sound like amateurs anyways...
Get rasterbator (free!), print out a tile set from some shock website of your choosing and have it ready. Next, get a graffiti crew ready with some spray adhesive, and go make a run to post this indecency at 2AM. (Might want to practice a dry-run or two ahead of time on a floor somewhere first, to get tile stacks in order for fastest posting.) Should be all done within an hour or less. 5AM traffic rush is on... Nice and large and right in public view.
Now that's trolling on billboards!
It's the Pol Pot theory of political reconstruction-
1) kill everyone (especially the academics) and destroy society as we know it.
2) Make sure you and your buds are the only ones left alive.
3) Start society over, your way this time.
4) Profit
I love how all the "I have friends who are scientists" and "Go read a real paper" people never drop names or link to studies. If you call them on it, they'll link to something from Fox News and tell you that Stephen Hawking is their uncle, then accuse you of being a typical lamestream librul who cannot address "the facts".
No. In the short run, maybe. But longer term, even the most dictatorial government needs some buy-in from the citizens; democratic ones need this more. And one sure way to get popular support is to encourage the populace to be panicked about stuff. H.L. Mencken probably said it best:
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
Our politicians are constantly encouraging people to be scared of something - maybe this year it's global warming but in earlier years the exact same role has been filled by: Iraq, Libya, muslims, "terrorists" of any variety, "glue-sniffing", "crack babies", "flag-burning", "GM crops", Alar, the "population explosion", "state militias", "killer bees", "christian fundamentalists", "cop-killer bullets", and many other topics. And yes, a few of these topics might even have been worthy of some concern, but you can't deny the overall dynamic has a consistent form: some faction of politicians (on the left or the right, it doesn't matter which) thinks that they can win elections by whipping voters into a frenzy about some scary new thing that will kill us all unless we put The Right People in charge. That faction seeks evidence to support claims of ruin and disaster; the opposing faction seeks evidence that the first faction's claims are specious.
Whichever factions are in power use the state's influence over science to encourage funding that is likely to produce results that make their side look better. results that make their side look worse will be ignored. There's also a Baptist/bootlegger component; some industries that benefits from the scare help pay for it. (in the case of the war on Iraq: defense contractors. In the case of global warming: various parts of the energy industry. For instance, oil companies that hope to profit by selling carbon credits, that have ties to "green energy", or that have especially good political connections such that they can hope to use new laws to get their own operations grandfathered in while hobbling their competitors.)
In short: Governments do generally benefit from scares such as catastrophic AGW whenever these scares can be used to justify giving more money, more votes, or more power to the political class. They benefit from raising alarm over global warming in exactly the same way they benefit from doing so in the War On Some Drugs and the War On Terror.
Right, there's your problem: What makes you think skeptics don't accept the possibility that atmospheric composition affects planetary cooling rates? The main disagreement at this point is over things like feedbacks - whether they are (and will continue to be) net-positive, how high they might be, how much harm that might cause over time interval X, how certain we can be about all this, what alternatives we have available to us, whether the cost of pursuing these alternatives outweighs their benefits (both now and in the foreseeable future), and basically whether we should be panicking yet or whether we can reasonably afford to wait and learn more. You also don't need to posit a "monstrous conspiracy" where mere publication bias suffices: scary results are easier to publish and make for better press releases than non-scary ones. "It's worse than we thought!" makes a good headline; "It's not quite as bad as we thought" does not. :-)
I play Nerd-Folk!
Global Warming or Climate Change is a theory, not a fact. This is another closed-minded name-calling post (amongst many on slashdot recently) against someone who has other theories or simply *does not believe* that theory. There is room for that in the world, unless you are a closed minded fascist like the OP. Grow up and open your mind to dissent.
Just a little point. The Growth rate is decreasing and has been for most of the last 50 years. Go to the UN Population site and see for yourself.
Depending on your baseline for the average decrease in growth rates the Eartth will max out at anywhere from 8-10 Billion and the range of years is 2047 to 2092. It all depends on your assumptions.
blah
Yes, the climate is changing, and yes you are an idiot if you believe that mankind has an impact any greater than a drop in an ocean. We are at the margin of the margin of the margin, and it requires limitless arrogance to think anything otherwise.
Here's what the proponents of radical action to stem greenhouse gasses do not get, is that all science has with it some element of uncertainty and that uncertainty is balanced against cost. It is not 100% certain what the effects of greenhouse gas emissions will be. Let's say, it is 99% certain, and then, as you drill down to locality, the certainty is reduced even more, until, you get to where you simply can't say what Delaware weather will be like in 5 years unless we just stop using fossil fuels.
Sure, if the cost of AGW remediation was like a few billion bucks, then, given the science that is out there today, its good enough to roll with. But the cost isn't a few billion dollars... it's -trillions- of dollars and ultimately a reduced living standard for most of the people on the planet earth. It's simply enormous, and while AGW proponents like to bandy about "unrealized costs", they also seem to neglect "unrealized or lost opportunity costs" that factor in that tax an increased energy foot print has, and its enormous. Like, how many more people will die, because they are pushed into the poverty well from increased energy prices. There will be less food, less transportation, less of everything, including drugs, and you can't fix that by cooking up some tax on the rich because all of their businesses are going to get hosed to... it's a self imposed dark ages..
So yes, some decisions need to be made. Why we aren't doing the smart thing and just rolling with modern nuclear power plant designs, and researching the hell of fusion, is utterly beyond me, and the fact that AGW advocates are more willing to wait for solar and wind technologies to supposedly come on line, tells me that the problem isn't as urgent as they say...
This is my sig.
Let's be brutally honest. The only real solution is to shut these deniers up once and for all through a pogrom of state sponsored censorship. Once this is accomplished we can move on to more forceful measures. It is hardly practical to crucify all members of this 'heartland institute' - but the political upside of crucifying one or two can't be ignored. In the name of science (of course).
'I don't know what it's called. I just know the sound it makes, when it takes a man's life.' ~ Four Leaf Tayback
1. & 2. are settled science. There's always some "doubt" in science, but not in the way you use the term. People like you, or more accurately the people who tell you what to think, profit from muddying the waters. Fear, uncertainty, and doubt... it's not just for software anymore!
No it is not. Even the East Anglia CRU admits that there has been no warming since at least 1995. Far more problematic is that Michael Mann's tree ring data doesn't even line up with accurate measurements of the past 150 years. And if you don't think that frauds like Michael Mann and James Hansen profit from finding a crises in every tree ring or peat bog, then you don't understand how academic funding works.
3. & 4. are irrelevant. Who cares whose fault it is? If it's going to disrupt our lifestyles, we should try to stop it. This is just some religious fundie bullshit. "Oh, there's no way humans could affect God's plan!"
That's pretty relevant if your solution is to alter human behavior. Whose the religious nutjob who thinks we should alter behavior even if it has no effect on warming?
Did you ever take a basic logic or rhetoric class, or did you just study a purple dinosaur that said really sciencey sounding stuff like, "SUV's are bad... mmm'kay."
5. That's what we're trying to do, but deniers are fighting tooth and nail to keep us from even trying.
Once again, 3 and 4 are pretty important if you want to accept 5. (You know what a flawed premise is, right?)
6. Yes, if you believe the science, the consequences would be severe. Not the end of the world, but a drastic reduction in quality of life for billions of people. But instead you've chosen to believe that all the scientists are in a big globe spanning conspiracy.
There is nothing "scientific" about unrepeatable experiments with secret algorithms and missing source data. #ScientificMethodFail
7. Taxing breath Strawman! Crippling the world economy FUD! Billions poorer, governments richer Bullshit! Do you think the governments are going to make a massive money pit filled with gold coins or something? They're not going to be richer, they're going to immediately turn around and spend that money. So your statement should have been "oil execs poorer, working class richer". And yeah, I'd be fine with that as a pleasant little side effect.
Yes, because that's what happens every time the "right people" get elected.
8. "Wind turbines causing warming." That story was revealed to be bullshit in the comments of Slashdot. It was only warming the area immediately around the windmill, not contributing to global warming. But of course, you wouldn't pay attention, because you want to believe all those stupid leftie ideas are back firing. You'll just gleefully go on spreading that lie 'til the end of time.
Are the comments in Slashdot now accepted as peer reviewed science?
Not really, the guy that made the claim is going through a process not unlike a lawyer disbarment or a de-licensing of a doctor.
If you really want to hitch your wagon to that, then so be it. But it looks like he scammed people. Choose your battles carefully. This is not one you'll win. That doesn't mean AGW is wrong. Merely that that one claim was wrong.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
I suggest you search for "global warming" on Google Images and look at what tendentious images come up from global warming activists: the planet in flames, scorched earth, etc. Both sides, both climate alarmists and climate change deniers, are guilty of gross distortions of facts and fear mongering.
What you said is simply not true. The body of evidence is not ridiculously overwhelming. For you to compare AGW to specific theories of Relativity or Evolution, and then to entire fields of study such as chemistry and biology, is dishonesty on your part--that or ignorance.
To top it all off, you call anyone who disagrees with you irrational. How ironic.
It reminds me of witchhunts--someone saying, "We all know she's a witch--the evidence is ridiculously overwhelming, and everyone in town agrees it's a fact. Holding out belief on the hope that at the last minute some impossible new truth that nobody ever considered is going to overturn the truth we all know, is at best magical thinking. It just doesn't have any rational basis and shouldn't be compared to rational thinking." All because a woman had a birthmark or something.
For just one example of how the scientific evidence is not conclusive nor overwhelming, look at this, which was posted earlier in the comments: http://youtu.be/-sHg3ZztDAw An MIT professor of meterology explains quite clearly how the scientific "evidence" that's claimed to support AGW is not even statistically significant! He even speaks against the president of MIT while working for her--he's not afraid to tell it like it is.
He also shows how authorities like the IPCC are misquoted and misrepresented by other authorities, and how it all trickles down. There's even a book by a man who's a proponent of using the "myth" of global warming as a rallying point for ideas and "characters and projects"--he said that we should ask "what global warming can do for us," and that it "transcends the science"! This politicising of AGW has been going on for 40 years, and the snowball is now big enough to be noticed by the population at large.
In the end, it becomes "accepted" or "common knowledge" by people like yourself--meanwhile, the truth is, at best, unknown. And having no scientific basis for their position, supporters of the "facts" fall back on peer pressure, bandwagoneering, ad hominems, labeling, and name-calling--saying that "deniers" are crazy. Actual rational thinking will see through such transparent manipulation.
Yes, sadly there are anti-AGW groups who use similar tactics--and shame on them as well. They obviously have their own agendas which are unconcerned with the truth--they merely would benefit from different outcomes, so they support the opposing view.
Both groups are irrelevant, however--what matters is the truth.
So my question to you is, what is your agenda? What is AGW doing for you? Is it helping you push your projects or desires? If AGW isn't true, do your goals stand on their own merits? Have you been brainwashed, or are you just dishonest and using the ends to justify the means?
Can you refute Lindzen's claims about the data and methods and models? That's the science--and if you can't refute what he said, then you can't support your own view.
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
We are saying...that GW is accepted by most informed people as fact, verging on irrefutable fact.
An unsupported assertion.
Even if true, it is logically irrelevant and not an argument in support of the conclusion of AGW.
How ironic is it when someone who claims that science supports a theory and that dissenters are unscientific makes an unscientific argument?
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
You're suffering from a burden of proof fallacy. This is one of the fundamental fallacies of the entire AGW movement.
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
Part of the problem is labeling and generalizing, as you do here--the us vs. them thinking. It divides, when we need to unite. It puts people on the defensive, which makes rational discussion difficult. It distracts from the real issues, and makes the issue one of politics.
Just stop it, will ya?
"Those who consume the bulk of goods are those who make them. We must never forget this secret of our prosperity."
And the violence of the riots are AGAINST the teachings of the Koran. As with your post, all I needed to do was only take those bits of the Koran that are pacifist and peaceful in nature and ignore all the bits that weren't.
Heartland are a symptom as are those at the other end insisting that humans are causing global warming. The real problem lies in between with the so called scientists who can't or won't follow the scientific method. They are pursuing their political agenda just as much as Heartland is to get more government and foundation funding. They wrap themselves up in their "scientific papers" that are pal reviewed but they are driven by a political agenda just like Heartland.
The serious scientists who raise valid issues with the IPCC reports and sloppy scientific papers get shouted down (a sure sign they are on to something). Please don't resort to "consensus" because that is political not scientific. Besides there is no consensus (http://www.petitionproject.org/review_article.php).
So what if science wasn't for sale? What if the scientists actually followed the scientific method? I think we'd be a lot better off.
If you think that humanities release of CO2 is causing global warming then please explain why for the past 12+ there has been no increase in temperature, and recently a drop, while CO2 from all sources is still increasing? If 12 years isn't enough for you then what would be?
The hubris of humans who think we know enough about climate to actually make the statements I've seen is appalling.
The truly sad part of all this is that the issue has become highly politicized on both sides. The pros spin their science, and the antis spin theirs. They engage in an emotional battle for hearts and minds, to the point where the issue resembles a religious debate, far more than a scientific discussion. On both sides, people take a position and look for whatever evidence supports it. And the media lines up behind the junk science on both sides--their only interest is in stirring the pot and keeping folks tuning in or logging on. Those of us who are genuinely concerned, but who have serious scientific doubts about both sides, are left to shake our heads and try to sort out the overwhelming junk, pro and con, from the paltry scientific evidence that actually exists to try to arrive at some reasonable conclusion. So long as the spin and the name-calling goes on, public discussion of this important issue will remain little more than a circus sideshow.
Anders Breivik explicitly stated in his writing that he thought global warming was a scam.
Sadly X can be just about anything once parasites get hold of it for a free ride - the carbon trading wet dream for economists that the USA slapped onto Kyoto is one example that has pointlessly siphoned off money, muddied the water and even now makes some people think economists are climate experts!
Whether there is something good, bad, true or false there are people that will attempt to get unfair advantage, but that doesn't mean the vehicle they use is the problem.
Note that I'm not calling the scientists parasites, it's a sobering comparison that no scientist on the planet gets paid as much as even the Sudoko puzzle writer Monckton gets for his travelling climate denial roadshow.
After all this, the conclusion is that pastafazou is lying through his teeth. He has spent a lot of time explaining that he refuses to post his sources. Why did he not spend this time to post them instead? It's because he doesn't have them. He's making stuff up. He's lying. Typical denier/creationist/etc.
Clever signature text goes here.