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Science By Democracy Doesn't Work
StartsWithABang writes The US Senate just voted on whether climate change is a hoax, knowing full well that debates or votes don't change what is or isn't scientifically true or valid. Nevertheless, debates have always been a thing in science, and they do have their place: in raising what points would be needed to validate, robustly confirm or refute competing explanations, theories or ideas. The greatest scientific debate in all of history — along with its conclusions — illustrates exactly this.
Because the majority said so.
Yes, it's called consensus and no, it isn't science. Not when politicians do it. Not when scientists do it.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
Is it a hoax? I'm on tenterhooks.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Consensus isn't science, but it's a method of determining which of the competing scientific theories should be used as a basis of policy. It may not be a good method, but other methods are worse.
Except for the persistent part.
Debate on scientific endeavors does work, because the primary purpose of congress is to fund various programs. Climate change debate in the political realm is all about transferring wealth from other productive areas of the economy. For arguments sake I'll agree there is climate change, and I'll agree to pay a few hundred million of our tax dollars for it, but no more. If you want to spent billions - well then, you've just discovered where the real debate is, and why this is going on in congress. I don't think it's as important as you think it is in dollar terms.
We can also argue about what's causing it, but at the end of the day it's about how many resources get allocated to doing something about it. Some of us think it's a fake issue to reallocate dollars into pet projects. It has happened before. What if we spend the billions and the next 10 years are the coldest on record? Will we get our money back or will we have to fund a new project to deal with global cooling?
Used to be that in a democracy we will weight the facts and then vote on a decision. Now it seems we live in a Yakov Smirnoff joke were we make the decision and then vote on the facts. Except it is not Soviet Russia...
I'd agree with that is the bill was just a vote on whether climate change is real or not. It's attached to another bill.
The democrats voted in mass for Obama Care. Are you saying that means they agree and support everything in it? Because recent history would prove that wrong.
The US Senate just voted on whether climate change is a hoax, knowing full well that debates or votes don't change what is or isn't scientifically true or valid.
You think this vote had anything to do with science? This is about power and policy. It's about pandering to a group of voters. It's about setting a stage for the next election. It's about getting votes. It has nothing to do with science and everything to do with power.
Science should inform public policy but nothing forces politicians to actually care what scientists tell them if the facts diverge from political needs. If a politician needs to proclaim that gravity is a hoax to get votes then they will do that and do it with a straight face.
How does one determine when science has "fully resolved" a question ? Also, it's impossible to not have a policy while we wait. Right now, our policy is to keep producing CO2 at about the same rate. What exactly should we base that policy on, if not for our current best scientific understanding ?
How does one determine when science has "fully resolved" a question? When the hypothesis has experimental/observational verification. Policy based on any other standard, like a consensus of dubious objectivity, is a crap shoot.
Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
In science nothing ever gets 'fully resolved'. It's not religion where babies burn in hell, then go to limbo to get more believers then they go to heaven to get even more believers. It's driven by understanding and improving that understanding.
The point of "this is perfect and certainly true" does not exist.
Thank you, Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and so many others, for courageously defending humanity, my freedom and more!
By 98 to 1, U.S. Senate passes amendment saying climate change is real, not a hoax
Personally, when "the senate just voted" is linked to something in the summary, I would expect the link to tell me more about the outcome.
When things get complex, multiply by the complex conjugate.
The data from the last decade fits the rising trend perfectly.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2...
By "self regulating eco-system" AC meant that Earth always has a climate. And at some point (indefinite future) it will stabilize. Did snowball Earth (if such existed) have climate? Yes. Was it stable? Sure, for a while. So there you have it.
Have you ever written a simulation? I have. You have to use simplification of calculations and use predetermined result tables to avoid doing the calculations to get any kind of speed in result return. This causes deviance from true simulation. The only way to accurately simulate the real thing is to build the real thing.
As someone who has written a number of simulations, you are full of shit. You certainly don't use lookup tables to determine results of the thing that you are calculating; if you have a well behaved submodel that is part of the larger simulation, you can use precomputed results but that is completely different. Further, you can get the simulations that they are running; here's one: GISS GCM E. They are 'true simulations' in any meaningful definition of the word; they are not using "predetermined result tables" to determine the results of the simulation.
The US Senate just voted on whether climate change is a hoax
Especially since (1) he doesn't tell us the result of the vote, and (2) he links back to yesterday's article on slashdot that covered the same thing, and to the same article on his web site as yesterday. Nothing - nothing - whatsoever to see here.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
You're right. We should use quantum mechanics instead as a basis for laws regarding houses, roads and bridges, because that's much more applicable to houses, roads, and bridges than Newtonian physics.
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
Just what exactly do you expect will happen if you almost double the amount of the atmospheres main persistent infra red absorber? And if you think it will have no effect can you please explain why you think this.
I'm just curious because I'm sure your stand is based on sound scientific reasoning rather than a rather pathetic attempt at self justification for a "lets carry on business as usual I don't care" approach to the issue which unfortunately is a standard human response to a lot of big problems.
The mean temperature may rise 0.6C. Could be marginally less due to negative feedbacks (hitherto underestimated cloud cover) and other random causes (more than average volcanoes popping, the sun having a fit, an asteroid impact...), could be marginally more due to positive feedbacks (water vapor amplification, hitherto belied by the facts) and other random causes (less than average volcanoes popping, the sun having a fit, ...). Let's assume another doubling follows after that before we can't pull any (hydro)carbon out of the ground anymore, because it's not worth to get. We're looking at 1.2C worst case, coming from a post-ice-age low.
I'm old enough to have lived through a significant part of the warming period, and experienced and wise enough to see and comprehend that its supposed negative effects are ranging from undetectable to utterly insignificant and easily adapted to, and will continue to remain so.
AGW biggest problems are its side effects: destructive interference by an idiocracy of dogooders, busybodies, recycled leftists and politicians and the time lost by more sensible people having to push back. Look at the cost to the society due to loss of productivity by this discussion alone.
Flourescent (adj): smelling like ground wheat.
The mean temperature may rise 0.6C.
Current state-of-the-art climate models span a range of 2.6–4.1 C, most clustering around 3 C, according to http://www.pik-potsdam.de/~ste...
None. When science hasn't fully resolved a question based on the evidence, none of the competing theories should be used as a basis for public policy.
Bogus. Science is not about "fully resolving" but about "models that work". Yes you could back the "wrong" scientifc theory when making policy, but in most cases they will differ only in corner cases. And even better, you can choose a response that addresses the problem, no matter which theory is correct. Even if global warming today was mainly caused by volcanoes, would it make sense to pump out even more CO2?
However, if there's a debate like there is in the US with climate change, with opinions 180 degrees the opposite, you can be sure that one side is only spouting complete bollocks and propaganda. Especially when you notice that one side has most of the scientists on its side, and the other mostly politicians.
"The more prohibitions there are, The poorer the people will be" -- Lao Tse
None. When science hasn't fully resolved a question based on the evidence, none of the competing theories should be used as a basis for public policy.
Now I understand the denial logic. Let say science is 90% confident that a comet is going to crash on the earth, we shouldn't do anything since the question is not fully resolved, right? That's just plain stupid, whether it's applied to a comet or climate change. Man made climate change is happening. Are we 100% confident? No, but close enough so that we should live accordingly. Again, is the science 100% settled? No. But while we continue research on the matter, there is no reason not to act.
So funny. First you say the data shows no global warming. Then you are shown the data, and the data shows a clear continuation of the trend with no pause whatsoever. Suddenly, when it is clear that the data no longer confirms your preconceptions, you turn against the data and say that it is not trustworthy. Then you go on to talk about how preconceptions can result in biases - but you seem to have no self awareness whatsoever! Classic :)
First of all, we haven't doubled CO2 yet. We've only added about 35%. Secondly, the 3C sensitivity is the steady state number. Right now, we're still in flux, as the oceans take considerable time to warm up. So, even if we stopped adding CO2 now, the temperature would continue to rise for decades.
The future hasn't happened yet.
By creating hypothesis and then testing it, experimentally and verifying results, you know SCIENCE.
That's what 95% of the climate scientists believe we have done. If that's not enough, please explain your exact criteria. WHO must do all the things you mention, and WHEN does the general public know they have been done correctly ?
The difference is that you can duplicate the tests, measurements and models, and that you are invited to come up with alternative explanations.
An interesting aspect of science is that all our models are always wrong. And we are always aware of that.
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