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The Gap Between What The Public Thinks And What Scientists Know
First time accepted submitter burtosis writes Despite similar views about the overall place of science in America, the general public and scientists often see science-related issues through a different lens, according to a new pair of surveys by the Pew Research Center in collaboration with the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). From FiveThirtyEight: "The surveys found broad support for government to spend money on science, but that doesn't mean the public supports the conclusions that scientists draw. The biggest gap between scientists and the public came on issues that may elicit fear: the safety of genetically modified (or GMO) foods (37 percent of the public said GMOs were safe, compared to 88 percent of scientists) and the use of pesticides in agriculture (28 percent of the public said foods grown with pesticides were safe to eat, versus 68 percent of scientists). There was also disagreement over the cause of climate change (50 percent of the public said it is mostly due to human activity, compared to 87 percent of scientists). Here’s a full list, via Pew Research Center, of the scientific issues the survey asked about."
"Scientist" is a woefully ambiguous term. As I scientist, I think GMO food is perfectly safe. I am a nuclear scientist and know little about the GMO process, but that doesn't matter. My opinion does.
That's because the general public get most (all) of their information about science from sources that have a particular goal in mind when it comes to how that information should be interpreted. First a fear is created, because fear sells, and then they offer a politics based (rather than facts based) answer, because relief also sells.
Further, people won't listen to scientists, but they will listen to news anchors and politicians, because fiction is far easier to understand than facts.
>safe to eat genetically modified food
Is it possible to genetically modify food to be unsuitable to eat? The answer is trivially: yes. Maybe they are talking about GM food created to be suitable to the consumption? But that's not what is written!
Same goes for pesticide, some are trivially unsuitable for food.
"The public" has a fixed amount of scientific knowledge when there's a fixed amount of time dedicated to it during our education. Total human knowledge, however, steadily increases. Hence, the gap widens. End of story.
Do you mean Bacillus thuringiensis toxin?
You mean the toxin that is classified as organic and can and is sprayed on plants as an organic pesticide?
You know the one where the only way to harm a human with it is to inhale it as a powder and in that form it causes the same damage as inhaling almost any other powder. Even inhaling sugar as a powder is bad for you.
That toxin is COMPLETELY inert inside humans. However insects and some fish can cleave the protein and can then be killed by the toxin.
The organic version is sprayed on plants, washes off and damages local aquatic life. The GMO version does not wash off and has no impact on local aquatic life. The GMO version also concentrates in the parts of the plant we don't eat.
The organic way of using BT toxin is worse in ALL WAYS than the GMO version.
Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD!
You should care BECAUSE they keep you locked in a 2 party system. It matters what the public thinks because you live in a democracy, meaning you are ruled by the people, people who are morons with no idea of how the world works. The only way to improve your situation is to 1) educate the public, or 2) install a dictator with a proper understanding of science and scientific results.
That's news to me. I didn't think the public could think :P
Goodbye Slashdot. You've changed.
People COULD open a respected source to learn the truth, but they instead CHOOSE to learn from inaccurate or biased sources (media, blogs, etc.).
And I'm not even talking about scientifically controversial issues, where one would have to read many different sources and then weigh them to form a proper theory. I'm talking about scientifically sound ideas such as evolution or global warming that hardly any scientist disagrees with, yet the public is still quite split on the issue.
You are kidding, right? Yes they have been tested.
http://archive.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/2225-no-health-concerns-for-gmo.html
When talking about the public, you should use the pronoun "we", not "they".
In the past after some drug or chemical had been around for thirty some years and it took that long to gather data. And meanwhile a lot of people died painfully diseased deaths
It would help enormously if the survey makers would kindly supply the correct answers to those questions (along with some indication of confidence intervals) so we could judge whether the "scientists" or the general public had got it right.
(Hint: in most cases I suspect the correct answer is "Please could you ask a more specific question that could lead to a meaningful answer, not one borrowed from a tabloid headline?")
E.g. I don't worry about dropping dead because I've eaten a GM tomato, I worry more about GM crops who's raison d'etre is to sell more weedkiller, or what insect-repellant varieties could do to insect populations (and whatever used to eat the insects that fed on the non-GM plants) and I worry like hell about all the world's essential food crops ending up '(c) & Pat. pending Monsanto , all rights reserved'.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Why do you think that GMO foods have more pesticides sprayed on them?
GMOs usually need far fewer pesticides sprayed on them, that is pretty much the point of them most of the time. They also wash off far fewer pesticides to the environment.
Large scale growing tends to use a lot of pesticides regardless of the type of growing that is used. Organic has the image of being all natural and no chemicals etc. That is completely and utter BS.
Now for your home garden that is easy to do organic and without using a lot of pesticides but that does not scale up.
Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD!
(climate scientists paid to parrot big oil's talking points, for example),
Just checking, you _do_ know that big oil sponsors most climate research? The one that supports AGW?
The myth about thousands of dollars sponsoring skeptics being anywhere near the billions sponsoring human caused global warming is readily propagated here - but it seems no one ever verified it.
>. Politicians push fear, and then lord their position and power over the people who they nominally serve.
Which one should keep in mind when looking at science. Scientists being paid by a grant from Phillip Morris (tobacco) or All Gore tend to publish conclusions that are likely to get the grant renewed. A lot of people I work with are top experts
in their field, whose jobs are dependant on a federal grant getting renewed. Guess how many of them published information that makes the grantor unhappy last year. Hint - it's a round number.
There is a huge gap between what we know about sex and gender from science, and what people generally believe about sex and gender.
I see what you did there.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
Spraying 100 acres box crop with pesticide is expensive. So Farmer Joe hasba choice:
Buy brand X seed and $10,000 of pesticide.
Buy brand M seed and pocket the $10,000.
Which will he do? Now you know why companies like Monsanto produce varieties that need far LESS pesticide, not more.
Shit, I'll just say it; It's post modern feminism
I love the smell of a grinding axe in the morning.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Doesn't make me wrong.
The media are meant to act as one of the bridges between the scientific communities and the general public but it's an area where they fall well short of the mark.
This reminds me of the study that was done, asking a group of people how well the media reported on their specific subject of knowledge. Most agreed that the media rarely got things right either by omitting essential information (e.g. "dumbing down") or making incorrect assumptions or correlations. The interesting thing is that the same group of people were happy to accept that the media reported accurately on fields outside their own subject around 90% of the time. Think about those two things for a minute, makes sense that we know more detail about our own subject, but why would we trust a source of information, for things we don't know, that we consider inaccurate for things we do.
Moore's law is not a law. Theory, yes; Predictable trend, certainly; Law, no.
That's not always correct. Roundup-ready crops sold by Monsanto (for example) are not resistant to pests, they are resistant to herbicides. They let you spray MORE, not less.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate
I do want to do more research on this and actually confirm it. The whole thing seems pretty strange compared to other source I have looked at and I want to be as accurate as possible on this issue since it is closely related to some of the work I do.
Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD!
Yes, but generally any scientist* trusts the scientific method and experimental evidence over other methods of coming to a conclusion. There are a few exceptions with biases (climate scientists paid to parrot big oil's talking points, for example), but generally scientists try to discover the truth, whether or not it conforms with their world beliefs.
No.
The book 'Big Fat Surprise" in its explanation of how the dietary guidelines of how a low fat diet isn't backed by good science, showed how the scientific process was derailed by egos of scientists, eminent people, scientific politics, and group think in the scientific community - as well as lots of money from the big food companies.
It's ironic how the public *thinks* so much; yet scientists *know* so little.
GM foods are safe*
Waterfox - a Firefox fork with legacy extension support, security updates and better privacy by default.
GMOs usually need far fewer pesticides sprayed on them, that is pretty much the point of them most of the time.
This depends entirely on the modification. The two most popular GMOs are "roundup ready" and "Bt." Roundup-ready plants are resistant to glyphosate, which allows farmers to use higher amounts of the herbicide. "Bt" plants produce their own insecticide, which allows farmers to reduce their external application of such agents. As glyphosate resistance transfers to weed plants, biotech companies have begun developing resistance to other herbicides: the next step in the evolutionary arms race.
Well you've done nothing except make a wild, axe-grindy claim that "feminists" are responsible for something. You haven't even elucidated what you're even blaming them for or why you think they're to blame.
So, while that lack of stuff doesn't make you wrong, it does make you lack credibility.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The Gap Between What The US Public Thinks And What Scientists Know.
You sez:
I would also like us to use more nuclear power. My views on nuclear power are less informed than my knowledge of GMO is. However, my views on nuclear power are still FAR more informed than the average person
Okay, as a person of Science, lemme try ask you, a fellow Scientist, the following ...
1. How do you know your view is "FAR more informed than the average person"?
2. You said you were "FAR more informed", so ...
2a. Who was the one informed you?
2b. And how do you know what you have been informed is correct?
I did reference Steve Pinker, and that there are no inherent differences between men and womens brains is the corner stone of post modern feminism. Without that assumption it loses all merit.
The reason why people don't trust GMO food for instance, is that it's sometimes impossible to undo mistakes that are made. Scientists tend to have tunnel vision and have made mistakes with global impact in the past. So I don't find this gap surprising at all. People are wary because they think scientists want to mess with the planet.
This is not the sig you're looking for.
Can't say I'm surprised by that. Psychology of gender has a less credible ring to it than evolutionary biology, neuroscience and linguistics though, since we know how politicized the social sciences are.
I think paycheck corruption in science today is even worse, like with the CAGW promoters.
IF that were true, then the climate scientists who know the "truth" would be able to get all the grants they want from the fossil fuel industry and "clean up" or least get a paycheck.
See, if global warming were in fact a hoax or even over-blown, the oil, gas, and coal industries would be handing out grants like candy with their unlimited money. I wold expect to see the battles like the cigarette industry put up.
But they are not. They only thing they have is press releases and propaganda - usually attacking AGW on political grounds (like increased taxes or some other nonsense.)
Which tells me that there is nothing there scientifically for them.
The evidence is conclusive: human caused global warming is fact.
The surveys found broad support for government to spend money on science
And in spite of that, the budgets for NIH, NSF, and DOE - the three largest funding agencies from the federal government for scientific research - has been consistently flat or declining in real dollars over the past decade-plus. If the people support it, they aren't communicating it well through their congressional representatives.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
If anything, the statistics indicate that Scientists aren't in agreement on the topics discussed-- in other words the science isn't settled or in some cases, hasn't been done.
You mean like.. what, caffeine? Caffeine is one of the most common "food produced poisons (insecticide)," as you called it, that humans consume every day.
Try to remember how biology works. Just because something is deadly, dangerous, or annoying to an insect doesn't mean it will have much (or any) effect on a mammal.
I did reference Steve Pinker
Specifically, you told me he has written several books. Saying, I have a point but you're going to have to read several books to figure out what the point is never mind the arguments for and against is not really very solid. I mean sure, you might have a point and you might be right, but I'm not going to do several weeks of reading just to find out.
and that there are no inherent differences between men and womens brains is the corner stone of post modern feminism.
The differences between male and female brains seems to be a subject of intense debate, whichpretty much means that the differences are subtle. There is undeniably more variation across humans as a whole than between genders on average. Secondly where on earth do you get your definitions of feminism from?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
You mean the toxin that is classified as organic and can and is sprayed on plants as an organic pesticide?
It's entirely possible to have organic cyanide, so that argument is irrelevant.
You know the one where the only way to harm a human with it is to inhale it as a powder [...] That toxin is COMPLETELY inert inside humans
Yeah, this specific fix ain't harmful to humans AFAWCT. But what it has done is lead to more resistant pests.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"Scientist" is a woefully ambiguous term. As I scientist, I think GMO food is perfectly safe. I am a nuclear scientist and know little about the GMO process, but that doesn't matter. My opinion does.
Good point. The glaring assertion that the sanctity of scientific authority would carry forth across disciplines, and that those in different branches of science carry more weight than say --- a layman who has put effort to research a specific subject --- is dubious.
One might even say this tabloid appeal to authority is religious... but I would not grace it like that. I have too much respect for my religious friends. I may not share their faith but I can easily see that they deliberately and carefully choose their sources of information (such as the Bible, ancient text and modern sermons) and consider the messenger with each message. They would not inherently revere a reverend with 'priest' rubber-stamped on the forehead any more than we should defer to the results of a poll whose categories are drawn from the presence or absence of a University degree in fields the pollsters considered to be 'sciency'.
Whatever the criteria for being one, scientists are part of the demographic 'public' in the real world.
There is also the fact that people who have read a fair amount in certain fields may understand the questions in a poll but because of their background they may have different perceptions as to the meaning. For example, when I saw the article "Americans Support Mandatory Labeling of Food That Contains DNA"... I did NOT spot it a mile off as a malicious trip-wire question to expose duh-idiots (which it apparently was). I recalled the recent scientific controversy over whether microRNA uptake in digestion might change gene expression in a harmful way, and whether any specific GMO food (by virtue of its narrow genetic origins) might, as an unintended consequence, be able to deliver such a payload. It was all over the news in the US a few years ago and the 'public' had every right to be concerned. Though the science is pretty well settled (see this excellent article) it turns out that the hysteria was fed partly by a failure of the scientific process, among other things. Years ago when the microRNA article was published it was refuted, too casually, even though its implications if true may be dire. Our DNA mechanisms are well-adapted to deal with these fragments and they are indeed very prevalent. This was never explained well enough to the public, who were thinking in terms of a new type of man-made 'contaminant' that had suddenly appeared in the food supply.
It is the "4 out of 5 dentists surveyed recommend Trident Sugarless Gum for their patients who chew gum" phenomenon, where the fifth dentist's opinion does not fit the message and is not even revealed. Could the fifth dentist have known or glimpsed something that would have blown all the others away, convinced them or shamed them? (the survey was actually 1,700 dentists).
If you show most anyone -- including 'scientists' --- a list of major Yellowstone eruptions over time and point out that it has been ~640,000 years since the last, and asked the question "Would you say that an eruption is overdue?" they will tend to say YES. They may even sense it is a trick question. But a geologist would shout "NO!!" and if another Geologist says yes, they would form a mob with pitchforks-mob and march to the door. Geologists are aware of the fuzziness of geologic time scales but above all, their too-casual answers have been used to dupe-scare people.
These polls have been taken before. And the tendency is to perceive them as a sort of exposé of how stupid the 'public' is. But for a few of
<blink>down the rabbit hole</blink>
If you are ACTUALLY interested in scientific literacy, then ask questions on which no major political faction has any stake.
I disagree: if you're willing to spew political talking points than pay attention to actual science, then that is a pretty good measure of being scientifically illiterate because that's more or less ignoring science because you don't like the conclusions it comes to.
Just because someone is politically and culturally invested in the idea that the earth is 6000 years old, doesn't make them any more scientifically literate than if they they were simply a nutcase.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Look, if you care more about science then your petty political rivalries, then just talk about the scientific issues that are not political.
In a perfect world in which we didn't have to account for politics, what you say would make sense. But we don't live in that world, and so it is a bunch of bollocks. We have to account for the political issues, and wishing otherwise won't change a thing.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Sometimes the debate is so politicized that even reputable sources get tainted. An example is one of the IPCC reports on climate change, where the summary (what most people and press would read) got changed for political reasons into an overly alarmist version that did not match the scientific data in the rest of the report. Quite a few contributors to that report objected to the change, and rightly so. Not because the report wasn't a cause for worry about our influence on the climate, but because such politics have no place in science. Besides, it gave opponents of the idea of AGW ammunition to dismiss the entire report, and call the integrity of the IPCC in question.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
You cant base laws on opinions - its why violent video games are legal to buy even though many people are of the opinion they are dangerous.
Yeah, except for repressive Eastern regimes like Australia, wait, what? They put a limit on the level of violence acceptable in video games. Guess you can base laws on opinions in Australia.
Until there is actual evidence of them being dangerous, they cannot be legislated against.
Guess you haven't heard of the "precautionary principle" in the EU.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
that's not what it said and you bloody know it, troll.
It said "food grown with pestidies are safe to eat", not "pesticides are safe to eat".
those are two completely different things.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
I would say that scientist B is guilty of patent infringement and should probably be prosecuted for it but only if the therapy was for sale on the market at a reasonable price (based on cost to develop etc).
However, any children that resulted from that patent would be completely free and clear in my view. They had no part in it. I would even extend that to other animals and plants so long as profit is not being made from the patent violation.
If you violate the patent and create a plain strain that you then sell then I think that normal patent law would apply.
Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD!
I'm little disturbed that the childhood vaccination poll is only 86 (scientists) vs. 68 (public). I would have anticipated a much higher value for the scientists.
My UID is prime!
So in other words, you complete faith in the scientists working for Phillip Morris, and the scientists working for Monsanto, and Exxon? I have something you might be interested in. It's a toll bridge, scientifically proven to make money for it's owner. Care to buy I
Oh, you think the scientists working for Monsanto are human, and therefore biased, but the guys working for Climate.org are superhuman, with no bias? I have this nice tower available in Paris you might like too.
+1
Priest: "Universe from nothing, no laws of physics, sped up time"+ huge discrepancies. Creationism? No. Big Bang Theory
"The differences between male and female brains seems to be a subject of intense debate, whichpretty much means that the differences are subtle."
This isn't logically valid reasoning. There is debate, therefore differences are subtle? There is a debate about creationism too. I guess that proves the jurys still out on creationisms scientific validity then.
Hard scientific data, as in meta studies in evolutionary biology, neuroscience and linguistics, tells us there are significant and fundamental differences between the sexes. There is very little data supporting the opposing argument.
That toxin was already sprayed on plants and is still being sprayed on plants. The GMO version has not changed the usage by much at all. What is HAS changed is the amount that runs off into the environment.
Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD!
If a scientist literally said "GMO crops are safe." I would not trust that scientist. That is too broad a question. If a scientist said "These specific crops are safe" or "Crops with these types of gene modifications are safe" then I would be more inclined to believe it. And then the next question is "safe for what?" Human consumption is one thing, the environment is another, the health of the agriculture industry is another, the health and diversity of food crops in general is another.
As for my definition of feminism, pretty much every single major feminist cause is rooted in the Tabula Rasa.
So where can I read your peer reviewed articles that comprehensively debunk the whole thing?
Exactly this.
What's funny is that when Climate Change Skeptics, the Koch Brothers, funded their own study and planted an outspoken critic of climate change science as the director of the research, that skeptic ended up becoming a believer and published an Op-Ed in the NYT explaining how wrong he had been to not accept the science.
But somehow people still find a way to rationalize it all away as just the invention of a bunch of wealthy limousine-riding scientists keeping down those poor, defenseless oil companies.
i ~ Celebrating Science, Cyberspace, Speculation
The sun gets colder, we get colder. Period.
The sun has been getting slightly cooler since the 1980's, and yet, we've been getting warmer. Period.
Come back when you know the difference between pesticide and herbicide.
That's not always correct. Roundup-ready crops sold by Monsanto (for example) are not resistant to pests, they are resistant to herbicides. They let you spray MORE, not less.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate
You've never farmed I take it? Round up is one of the least expensive, and also very safest to humans. You can drink it and be alright. If you make it a habit you likely increase your cancer risk. As a herbicide, it impacts plants, not animals. More over, if you spray it shortly before or after a rain there's a good chance even the plants won't be impacted to much because it breaks down so fast in water. Even without water after a day or two even plants aren't harmed by it anymore, that's how sage it is. Better still though, having your crop immune to it means that you only have to spray 1 chemical to wipe out all weeds, because round-up is a very effective general purpose herbicide wiping out most any plant it hits while it's active. That means instead of spraying expensive combinations of different herbicides to get weeds but not your own crop, round-up ready lets you use one chemical, and effectively too.
The Pew poll compares what AAAS members believe with what the general public believes. For each of the questions, only a small number of AAAS members is actually qualified to have an informed opinion, for the rest, you are simply asking a member of a particular social class with no particular qualifications.
Furthermore, many of the questions are either ambiguous or value judgment.
For example, the question "is it safe to eat geneticallly modified foods" is quite ambiguous. Does that mean that genetic modifications are always safe, no matter what? Or does it mean that all currently approved genetically modified foods are safe? Or does it mean that genetic modification by itself doesn't cause foods to be dangerous? (If you think it means the last of these statements, try to figure out what that would mean.)
Favoring the use of animals in research is a value judgment, not a scientific one. So is the question of whether childhood vaccines should be required. Etc.
Note that Pew gets it right when they entitle the article "Public and Scientists’ Views on Science and Society". These are differences in views, not differences in facts. And the differences in view are rooted not just in different kind of knowledge and expertise, but also different value systems and different economic self-interests.
For many of the responses, it's easy to figure out the scientific reasoning behind why scientists on average believe what they do. For some of them, I would prefer if the general public move more in the directions of the scientists (e.g., evolution, astronauts, nuclear power plants). For others, I'd prefer if the scientists moved more in the direction of the general public (e.g., population growth, offshore drilling, fracking). For several of them, I wish everybody refused to answer because the question is the wrong question or even rooted in incorrect assumptions to begin with (e.g., climate change, GMO).
Mostly, what the poll really shows is that, while science doesn't have a liberal bias, scientists most certainly do. And Slashdot should stop treating statements by scientists as gospel truth. Even experts in a field often get it wrong, and scientists on average are no more qualified to comment on scientific matters outside their (usually) narrow field than anybody else.
Then don't claim your study is measuring anything about science.
Admit it is a political survey. Then that is also fine. But issuing a political survey under the pretense of science demeans both the people issuing it and science itself by associating it with politics.
Science is inherently apolitical. Any political faction that presumes to claim to be the party of science is both wrong and effectively attacking science at the same time. Science does not ally with factions. Science is science.
Science is the autistic kid that is great at math. That kid doesn't take sides. That kid isn't even aware of the sides. Saying he is with you is like one kid or another grabbing the autistic kid and CLAIMING he is on their side.
Now can any given political faction probably cite one thing or another that science agrees with more then their rivals? Sure. But by the same token, the opposition probably has more then a few things going for them as well.
You can't claim science is on your side unless the opposing faction really is just anti science in general. And there is no major political faction in western civilization that is generally against science. You'll find factions that are against some concepts or theories or even just hypothesis in science but not an actual opposition to science itself.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Real work, done by non-students, in places where they're paid a salary to develop things for their employers, tends not to get published by IEEE transactions:
1) the employer considers the design info as business sensitive: how to make a better widget is a competitive advantage
2) The employer is paying you to design and build stuff, not write papers for IEEE journals. Even at ostensibly more academically oriented research labs, one still gets the "you can do that paper in the evening and weekend, but I need that hardware delivered on schedule"
3) Conferences (the first step) require authors to present their papers in person. Employers aren't interested in funding travel to conferences: it costs money, and it takes key employees away from business.
4) (less important) the journal reviewers & editors are from academia (they have the time to spend on it, industry toilers do not, see above) and tend to favor academically oriented papers.
This is why you get 30 papers on some obscure and different implementation of a transistor circuit done on a multiproject wafer for WiFi frequencies: nobody in the commercial world is going to spend their time figuring out the effects of changing the biasing at a component level at a lower level of integration than any commercial process in use AND the student is hoping to get some pubs that will be useful when they apply for a job at a startup in the wireless industry. The student's advisor is happy because it's a project that takes less than a year to execute.
Then don't claim your study is measuring anything about science.
From the fine study, entitled Public and Scientistsâ(TM) Views on Science and Society — "Opinion Differences Between Public and Scientists". Guess what? The study is measuring opinion, and you are just ranting.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
http://blog.sustainability.col... Pretty timely, and hopefully more people in the scientific sector will take this approach: winning the hearts and minds of the public isn't primarily a facts-driven task. It's one that has to take into account the origin of the fears and is as much a public relations issue as "THE SCIENCE SAYS ...".
Even if the science does say :)
Wrong and illogical.
First, if you are measuring knowledge, the question is whether people are AWARE of the subject and the relevant variables.
Second, ignoring what you know to and instead holding to ideological positions even though they are in opposition to what you know about science is not evidence of ignorance of science but rather evidence of a strong ideological association.
Third, as to your final statement that being invested in something fallacious doesn't make you more scientifically literate then a nutcase... this is irrelevant. The question is not whether they are nutcases or not but rather whether they are ignorant of the science. If I know everything you know about science but conclude instead that the world is 6000 years old then I might be a nutcase. However, I would not be ignorant of the science. I would quite clearly and by definition know everything you know. I simply would be choosing to believe something different DESPITE knowing the science.
The problem with the study is that it is looking politically charged science issues as being the most important questions about science that someone should know. That is clearly nonsense. Newton's laws of motion for example are a great deal more important for scientific literacy then whether or not you believe in global warming for example. The only entities that regard global warming as the most relevant are the political entities that are fighting political fights over those issues.
This study is survey of public opinion about politically charged science issues. It is NOT a science literacy survey. Remove the political issues and ask uncharged scientific questions. Ask physics questions. Ask chemistry questions. Ask biology questions. Ask mathematical questions.
THEN you'll be conducting a scientific survey. Just asking as bunch of questions about issues that are ideologically charged simply gives the false impression that people that believe in ideology X are smarter then people that believe in ideology Y. When in reality, the knowledge of both X and Y is probably about the same. The difference would be that X or Y has different conclusions or interests in the issues which leads to differing conclusions and arguments. However, that doesn't mean either X or Y has superior knowledge.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Wrong. The study is purporting to be a study about science when it is in fact focused on politically charged science issues.
It is therefore a study about politically charged science issues and and not simple scientific literacy.
Ask some physics questions. Ask some chemistry questions. Ask some biology questions.
The questions in this "study" are the sorts of questions politicians ask and campaign upon. That renders them inherently political.
I am quite tired of political ploys masquerading as science.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
The study is purporting to be a study about science when it is in fact focused on politically charged science issues.
People don't have opinions on science issues which aren't politically charged.
I am quite tired of political ploys masquerading as science.
And I am quite tired of people ignoring the language.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"Scientists" are only human, and subject to financial influence and personal bias. Some examples of "perfectly safe" products follows:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...
"List of withdrawn drugs"
"Some drugs have been withdrawn from the market because of risks to the patients. Usually this has been prompted by unexpected adverse effects that were not detected during Phase III clinical trials and were only apparent from postmarketing surveillance data from the wider patient community."
There follows a long list of drugs that underwent clinical trials and were declared perfectly safe for human use, yet were recalled for various reasons.
There is a continuing conflict over the safety of prolonged cell phone use, with many stating that there are currently no studies showing adverse effects. However, the World Health Organization (WHO) says the following:
"...However, because many cancers are not detectable until many years after the interactions that led to the tumour, and since mobile phones were not widely used until the early 1990s, epidemiological studies at present can only assess those cancers that become evident within shorter time periods. However, results of animal studies consistently show no increased cancer risk for long-term exposure to radiofrequency fields..."
There has also been a shift from using Chlorine for water treatment to using Chloramine. This is particularly annoying to me as I previously worked as a licensed Wastewater Lab Analyst.
http://www.chloramine.org/chlo...
"The EPA states that there are NO dermal (skin) and NO inhalant (respiratory) studies on chloramine as used as a disinfectant for drinking water."
"The EPA states that there are INADEQUATE cancer studies on humans or animals."
"Chloramine is a less effective disinfectant than chlorine. The World Health Organization (WHO, PDF 145 KB) says that "monochloramine is about 2,000 and 100,000 times less effective than free chlorine for the inactivation of E. Coli and rotaviruses, respectively.""
So there are a great many things that have been declared "perfectly safe for human use" that are in fact very questionable, especially if you have a deeper understanding of the process by which these things are declared "safe".
I disagree with the headline here. The presumption is that the public merely thinks, but may be wrong, and scientists actually know facts.
Everyone listens to those whom they respect. Some are taught to respect firebrand preachers; some believe any idiot with a PhD. Some look for truth in Biblical quotes, but can't read; others believe in scientific method, but couldn't explain scientific method if you gave them a cheat sheet.
Example: Is the world flat or round? Well, people we respect say that it is round. But how many average citizens have a clue to the evidence?
This isn't logically valid reasoning. There is debate, therefore differences are subtle? There is a debate about creationism too. I guess that proves the jurys still out on creationisms scientific validity then.
OK fine. There is very serious debate among the people who actually study this about what the nature of the differences are and if there are really any significant ones at all. There's a slew of papers, counter claims and so on and so forth. That means there aren't any obvious, glaring differences.
Hard scientific data, as in meta studies in evolutionary biology, neuroscience and linguistics, tells us there are significant and fundamental differences between the sexes. There is very little data supporting the opposing argument.
I've never seen any evoloutionary biology studies which support it, so [citation needed]. And define significant. If there was a significant difference, you could pick a man and a woman from the population at random and make some prediction about mental capacity (discounting any cultural factors) and be right some "reasonable" amount of time.
"reasonable" of course is the core of how significant it is. There might be a provable prediction you can get right 50.0001% of the time, which would mean there is a difference but it wouldn't be very significant.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
As for my definition of feminism, pretty much every single major feminist cause is rooted in the Tabula Rasa.
huh?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Second, ignoring what you know to and instead holding to ideological positions even though they are in opposition to what you know about science is not evidence of ignorance of science but rather evidence of a strong ideological association.
One could well argue that this is a deep degree of ignorance: it indicates on a very fundemental level that people do not understand that science is a matter of "belief". And fundementally if disbelieve it because of ideological reasons that shows such a fundemental misunderstanding of what it is that it is a better indication than any number of facts.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The are both 'cides'.
http://wordinfo.info/unit/2782
Round-up(glyphosate) though is one of the least toxic herbicides out there. Numerous studies have all concluded that it poses no risk to human health. It's far less toxic than Chlorine, and we purposely load that into our drinking water. The Chlorine in our drinking water is strictly speaking being used as a pesticide to kill off unwanted bacteria like E. Coli, and you don't see anybody crying out for us to stop that horrible practice of an evil chemical that is harming us all.
There is a famous quote that goes something like this:
" I would much rather be governed by the first two hundred names in the phone book than by the faculty at Harvard".
This is so true. You take people such as those in the faculty at Harvard. Most have never worked in the private sector or in the real world. They are ivory tower academics with little real world experience or common sense. Yet these are the same enlightened scientists that we should revere and they should tell us how to live. No thanks.
Question:
1, Are those children 'patented'?
No more than a person cured by a patented drug. People are not patentable.
Your other questions have the same answer.
This philosophical foray makes me think a large degree of cannibis was involved.
Shup and pass those fritos, man!
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
only if the therapy was for sale on the market at a reasonable price
So if the government doesn't like your price, they strike down your patent?
I'd be thinking more along the lines of a non-commercial-use exception, as you allude to later in your comment (which, iiuc, doesn't exist in any country's patent law today).
First you criticize me for using Steve Pinker as a reference. It was unreasonable of me to ask you to read a book which extensively and thoroughly explains the evidence.
So i tl;dr it for you, and now all of a sudden you're all "citation needed!"?
Fine. Shall I give you the amazon link to his book, or is that also too much to ask?
Evolutionary biology is the science of the mechanism of life. Understanding sexual reproduction, that is, what it is, why it exists, and why it is efficient, is something only biology can do.
We know for a fact that for sexual reproduction to work, males and females have to act differently.
Go ahead. Name a major feminist cause that is not rooted in the notion that men and women are not different, that we are all blank slates.
What I don't like is a company patenting something just to keep anyone from using it.
I don't think it should be legal to buy a competing technology for instance and then license it so high or refuse to license it such that the technology is dead until the patent has expired. Too many technologies related to battery technology have been slowed down that way.
What I would be looking for is a serious effort to sell the patented product and actual people paying for it. if it is determined that you don't hold the patent in good faith then it should be invalid. Remember a patent is something that society grants in exchange for what we get from the patent. At least in the USA a patent is not some kind of natural right.
That should be true of all patents. Society gives up something so that a patent can exist. If the agreement is not held up it should be invalid and the invalid state is the information is generally available.
Computer modeling for biotech drug manufacturing is HARD!
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01...
Just noticed this relevant article today too, about how poorly-communicated and -understood relatively simple information regarding non-contentious medical advice, like "take aspirin to reduce risk of heart attack'.
Using the above as an example, if 2000 people took aspirin daily for 2 years, it's estimated that in that population there would be 4 heart attacks instead of 5. The benefit may be clear and proven, but is it reasonably communicated how minuscule that actual benefit is?
-Styopa
... What? This is perhaps the most idiotic thing I've seen today.
You're saying that people ONLY have political opinions? So if I like red cars that is a political opinion? Or when I say I like red cars, I must be lying because it isn't political?
I have lots of science opinions that aren't political.
Are you saying "people" are some non-person group that unlike you or me is incapable of having non-political opinions? Because they aren't non-persons. The reason "people" appear inhuman is because the concept of "people" is inherently dehumanizing. It typically involves generalizing large numbers of people and only looking at a few variables you're interested in which boils lots of people you know nothing about down to a few numbers. Which is of course inhuman but that is not because they are inhuman but because your analysis dehumanized them.
This is just so fundamentally fucked up I don't know where to start with it.
I think you confused yourself.
If you honestly don't have a single scientific opinion that isn't political then you don't give a shit about science in the first place and shouldn't even be having this conversation.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Mommy issues? Is that your problem? Or were you laughed at by some women? There has to be something to make someone so hell-bent on kicking up a stink about acting like a decent human being...
Usually they force compulsory licensing rather then strike down the patent though I believe in the past patents have been basically nationalized and generally the threat is enough to lower patent fees.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
No you couldn't argue it is ignorance unless they literally don't know. If they know... then they have KNOWledge of the issue. And if they have knowledge of it then they're not ignorant of it.
Disagreeing with you doesn't make someone ignorant unless they are UNknowing of your position or the issue.
For example, lets say someone that gets a degree in geology and astronomy says that the world is 6000 years old.
Is that person ignorant of geology or astronomy? Nope. They passed their tests. They got a degree in the subjects. Which means they knew what answers those subjects said were correct and answered them correctly consistently enough to get a degree.
So what does it mean when that same person says the world is 6000 years old? Well, it means that is what they are saying for "some" reason. You don't know why. But ignorance isn't one of the reasons because they clearly know the answer in the text books.
They could be crazy... they could have gun against their head with a person that says that if they don't answer X or Y they'll kill him. You don't know WHY they're saying that. But if they know the science then they're not ignorant.
They don't have to agree with the science to know it. Do you get the distinction? If I know your name is John but I also refer to you as frank, then I am not ignorant of your name. I am CHOOSING to call you frank even though I know your name is john. Maybe I'm doing it to offend you? Maybe I'm doing it for some other inscrutable reason. It is hard to say. But you can't say I am doing it because I am ignorant of your name.
Get it?
Seriously, if you ACTUALLY care about finding out who is literate in science and who is not... do not ask politically charged questions.
Ask questions about physics, chemistry, and biology that don't really have any political weight. What you should find if you do that is that there isn't an ideological distinction between those that know and those that don't. There are a lot of people ignorant of science from all political camps. And there are plenty of scientific geniuses from all political camps.
If you ask a politically charged question then you're going to get a politically aligned response. That isn't surprising. If you want to ask about science - PERIOD... then ask about science - PERIOD.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
You call them worthless but then in the very same sentence you admit that they are all-powerful.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
If I understand the report correctly, they sampled "scientists", but not scientists actually working in the field. E.g. the fraction of scientists working on climate who attribute climate change to human activities is around 99% (IIRC), not below 90%. So all they did is compare a group with average education levels to a group with very high education levels (measured in obtained degrees). Not sure that tells us much. The sentence "that doesn't mean the public supports the conclusions that scientists draw" at least does not follow.
Some are things like having your food produce poison (insecticide). I'm not sure how my food containing more poison is more safe.
Probably for the same reason you use WiFi. You think there is a level of poison that is safe (Paracelsus says hi), whereas someone uninformed may think even a single molecule / ray is the devil.
Regarding your other misconceptions:
I'm not sure how my food containing more poison is more safe. Have the scientists actually studied it, or are they just assuming it's safe because other scientists made it?
There is a reason insecticides are put in: to combat insects, as the name suggests. Which can affect your food in a negative way. It's a trade-off with a benefit. Otherwise go for organic food, which uses other solutions (typically more manpower).
The study of the effects of toxins is a serious topic. There are safety standards for virtually every chemical -- ask your consumer protection agency. Typically the limits are derived from medical studies.
NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
I have precisely the same problem with feminism as I have with creationism. Ideology posing as science and fact. And thanks for the ad hominem. I always know I'm doing something right when people use it.
As other have mentioned before me, a nuclear physicist will likely know more about GMOs for example than the average high school grad.
However, this does not make him an expert on the subject, and although his opinion is his opinion and he has a right to express it, it should not hold any weight when it comes to making policy.
This is because he did not spend years of his life specializing in bio-engineering. He does not spend his career days, day in day out, reading studying and keeping up to date on the latest developments. Only Biological Engineer should have the ability to make claims on the safety of GMOs.
Same with nuclear power. Although Biological engineers might be more educated than the average person on the subject, this does not mean he knows enough to be helping to shape policy on the merits of nuclear energy.
So when studies such as this come out that have polled "scientists" on their opinion on certain (usually controversial topics) they tend to do more damage than good, IMHO.
Decisions and laws should be made based on facts and research on hand at the time. Not opinions. And should be revised when new developments occur.
So, does additional patent infringement occur when those children reproduce?
What if instead of humans, they were some other species and a third-party human caused them to reproduce -- would that third party human be liable?
Normally, a legal remedy for claims of patent infringement is for the infringing party to cease infringing. Would that be ethical -- or even possible (if, for example, the modified organisms escaped into the wild) -- in this situation?
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
It's not 23% of your income. It's under 0.05% of the GDP. You do realise that you eat food, right? You do realise that climate change will drastically affect our agriculture industries, reducing crop production and moving suitable ground away from the people who are capable of farming it (and that's the best-case scenario - the worst case is the climate suitable for raising the crops we need will be in places which have the worst soil for it).
Your ignorance is staggering, and the fact you seem happy with it is bewildering. You deserve the future you get.
If you honestly don't have a single scientific opinion that isn't political then you don't give a shit about science in the first place and shouldn't even be having this conversation.
I'm speaking in generalities. This was a survey of lots of people, not just slashdotters. You're being obtuse. Is it deliberate, or are you just frothing?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
No you couldn't argue it is ignorance unless they literally don't know.
I'm arguing that id they disbelieve science because of ideology then they are ignorant on what science fundementally is. That I think is more important than ignorance or knowledge of lists of facts.
Get it?
I understand the point you're making, I happen to disagree.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
So, does additional patent infringement occur when those children reproduce?
If so, it would be pretty rare, since the patent's term will have expired by the time most of them are having children.
However, any children that resulted from that patent would be completely free and clear in my view. They had no part in it.
I just wanted to point out how amusing this statement is when discussing genetic engineering, considering your username.
First you criticize me for using Steve Pinker as a reference.
Nope, I'm not criticising you for using him as a reference, I'm criticising you for breezily telling me he's written a few books by means of explanation. That's great, but I'm not going to spend 3 weeks reading to know what point you're trying to make.
So i tl;dr it for you, and now all of a sudden you're all "citation needed!"?
OK let me explain for you. The way you argue things is you first make a point. You then back up the point with arguments. The arguments and especially facts may then be supplemented by citations to make them more convinving.
You simply provided a citation (Steve Pinker) with no point and no argument/fact. How would I even use a citation like that?
In this case you came up with a fact (there ARE studies which support...) without providing any corroborating evidence.
We know for a fact that for sexual reproduction to work, males and females have to act differently.
I asked you to provide some facts. You are providing abstract (and very simplistic) reasoning. You are seriously ignorant of biology as well. So if "for sexual reproduction to work" "makes and females HAVE to act differently", then how on earth do you explain plants which are often but not exclusively hemaphoraditic and just kinda sit there and grow towards the light? No brain is required at all for sexual reproduction.
Seriously the evidence for that literally grows on trees.
So go on provide some evidence that evoloutionary biology means that men and women have different brains.
Go ahead. Name a major feminist cause that is not rooted in the notion that men and women are not different, that we are all blank slates.
Er how about that cause where are a bunch of people are trying to stop other people from mutilating young girls so they will be unable to get pleasure from sex when they are older?
Since you're convinced that men and women are different and that this somehow goes against all feminism, I'm going to say this: your brand of nutty antifeminism does as much damage to men as it does to women. Please stop.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I have precisely the same problem with feminism as I have with creationism. Ideology posing as science and fact.
Feminism: the radical notion that women are people.
And you're ideologically opposed to that because it's posing as science and fact? U wot m8?
And thanks for the ad hominem. I always know I'm doing something right when people use it.
Or, it might just mean you're like that chap from the "lol i trol u" comic.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Let's be honest about it, every scientist is not Einstein and every scientist is not altruistic and truly pursuing the interests of mankind. There is enough mediocreness, politics and hidden agendas in the realm of science that being sceptical makes sense. Plus the public mostly get filtered access to scientists through "media", which looks increasingly less like media and more like a circus. And let's be scientific about it ... a lot of the "facts" we had 30 years ago have been replaced by new "facts". Most science seems to be about finding statistical correlations and then making confused and incorrect conclusions mixing cause and effect. A lot of the statements from scientists seems to be speculations outside their true field of expertise. And then there is "science" like some corners of cosmology which includes layers and layers of wild speculation which gets presented as things we "know".
I'm not saying there is anything wrong with science or scientists. I am just saying that scientists are people, with all the flaws that people have and all the problems with outputs of processes of people working together, and it would be unscientific to ignore that - as most scientists regularly do.
Why should I hold your opinion on something outside your field of expertise in higher esteem just because you are an engineer? My neighbor down the street may be just as well read on the subject, but may be a mechanic, but you posit that your opinion is more valuable to society because you are a scientist/engineer? I would assume, you have empirical data to support that premise.
I go to my doctor when I am sick. If I needed advice about nuclear engineering, I'd go to a nuclear engineer. Likewise, for other fields. But no matter how well read a nuclear engineer may be on various medical texts, I'm not going to rely on his unprofessional opinion, when I am sick. Likewise, outside one's field of expertise, our opinions are just as unprofessional as neighbor down the street and should carry as much weight.
This is nothing new. 100 years ago, in small communities, the doctor or the preacher was the most learned person so the community deferred to them for all sorts of decisions. Often, their advice was wrong and led to all sorts of negative outcomes. Why? Because those doctors and preachers were learned, but they weren't often qualified in the areas they were being asked to advise on. Likewise today's scientists and engineers may be more learned than the population as a whole, but that doesn't make us any more qualified outside our fields than anybody else. To think otherwise is just arrogance.
Feminism: the radical notion that women are people.
That is an absurd definition. That's like saying "Christianity: the notion that there is one god". Yeah there's a lot more to it than that "m8", and I reserve the right to criticize ideology based on the actions of it's followers regardless of what they offer as their own definition.
Feminism has been spreading lies about sex and gender for decades. It has also been able to label all critics as misogynists, as clearly illustrated by your reaction.
Scientists trust scientists in other fields because they assume scientists have based their opinions on solid scientific evidence.
Unfortunately, they also are subject to the fundamental human bias that, when you model the behavior, you tend to base your model on what you know about yourself. Even if you know. intellectually, how dumbass a large portion of the population is, when it comes to projecting their predicted behavior, you'll be subject to this bias at some level. So for example, while a majority of scientists support more nuclear power, the majority of scientists are imagining nuclear power plants not built on disaster-prone real estate, because after all, who would do that?
Someone had to do it.
That is an absurd definition.
It's a glib joke.
That's like saying "Christianity: the notion that there is one god".
That's quite a big part of it. There's whole passages in the bible about slaughering people who believe in other gods. It was quite a big thing back in the day, when Abrahamic religions got started. Possibly, that was THE defining thing about it in the beginning.
I reserve the right to criticize ideology based on the actions of it's followers regardless of what they offer as their own definition.
Well then would you actually get on and criticise? All you've done is whine all over the internet about the evils of feminism without actually saying why you feel they're evil.
You've also whined that it's bad science, and yet failed to provide a definition. I strongly suspect your definition of "feminism" is "things I hate on the internet".
Feminism has been spreading lies about sex and gender for decades.
Such as?
It has also been able to label all critics as misogynists, as clearly illustrated by your reaction.
That's a sort of reverse ad-hom attack. Interesting.
You do also seem to be one of those people who insists men and women are "just different", in some vague sort of hand-wavy evoloutionary-biology way that focusses on a small branch of lobe-finned fish while claiming to be a global truth. What this means is you're almost certainly drawing conclusions about people based on their genitalia rather than on what's in their head. This means you're almost certainly mistaken about many of the women and men that you know.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The claim is that there are fundamental inherent differences between men and womens' brains. To give some examples of what these are: investment in offspring, risk taking, and differing interests. The citation for that claim is Steve Pinkers Book "The Blank Slate", which in turn provides references to studies.
Male and female plants still have to act differently. They just do not require a brain to do so. You do not seem to fully understand the implications of humans being a sexually reproductive mammal.
Look, females have a cap on their reproductive success, males do not. Given how important reproductive success is, we expect sexes to behave differently because of this. Males want more sex partners and are less choosy, because sex i cheaper for males. This imbalance is why sexual reproduction works Men compete for females, and females preference for good genes drives the species forward.
Er how about that cause where are a bunch of people are trying to stop other people from mutilating young girls so they will be unable to get pleasure from sex when they are older?
I think you will find that feminism is surprisingly friendly to Islam, and how women are treated in these countries is not a major feminist issue, compared to say, violence and sexism in media. Feminism is concerned mainly with western culture.
Asking scientists questions about topics for which they are not domain experts is misguided at best.
Such as?
Gender as a social construct, and social constructionism in general are their main lies. No evidence whatsoever for either.
I hope the irony of you ( erroneously ) accusing me of an ad hominem argument, and then in your very next sentence you - yet again - use it, is not lost on you.
Male and female plants still have to act differently.
You know that most angiosperms are hemaphoraditic, right?
The fact that hemaphoriditic organisms exist and reproduce sexually indicates strongly that they do not in fact need to behave differently. And tell me, for plants whihc are not hemaphoriditic, how do they behave differently?
Look, females have a cap on their reproductive success, males do not.
Oh jeez. You seem to be presenting this as a "univeral truth" again. Go tell it to a sea-horse. Or a queen bee. Or an angler fish. Or a goose (they mate for life. did you know that?).
we expect sexes to behave differently because of this
By "we expect them to behave differently" you mean "I want to make a bunch of unwarranted assumptions about human sexuality based on cod-evolution and discounting the last 10,000 years of human society".
Males want more sex partners and are less choosy, because sex i cheaper for males. This imbalance is why sexual reproduction works Men compete for females, and females preference for good genes drives the species forward
How on earth does that explain the way that Bonobos (our closest relative) carry on?
I think you will find that feminism is surprisingly friendly to Islam, and how women are treated in these countries is not a major feminist issue, compared to say, violence and sexism in media. Feminism is concerned mainly with western culture.
OK, well, if you define feminism with your own private definition that no onw but you knows, then sure, you get to define it however you like and can tell everyone else they're wrong about it. On the other hand, words mean things and if you use private definitions known only to you then people will start to think you're very silly.
To make such statements shows an entertainingly high level of ignorance.
It's also entertaining that your biological-based explanations show an astounding level of ignorance about biology as well.
I strongly suspect that you hold these views because of blind adherence to ideology, rather than facts or logic.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Gender as a social construct
I think you're confusing post modernism with feminism. Or possibly some loopy old, far out whackjob branch of feminism. To re-use your analogy, that would be like defining Christians by the acts of the Heaven's Gate sect.
I hope the irony of you ( erroneously ) accusing me of an ad hominem argument,
m8, u need to lurn to reed.
Reverse ad-hom was you pre-emptively accusing me of making ad-hom attacks before I actually made any.
yet again
Well, it can't be "yet again" if it's the first time, now, can it?
Anyway, you seem actually not understand what ad-hom is. Me making observations about your likely motivations is not ad-hom. Me calling you a moron is ad-hom.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
, that skeptic ended up becoming a believer
He wasn't a skeptic, he was always a believer. I've gone back and read his sayings, they were things like, "we need to make sure our data is solid, otherwise people won't believe there is global warming." That's a reasonable scientific thing to say, but because of that, other people labeled him a skeptic and even a denier. He didn't label himself that way until it was useful, to show he had 'reformed'.
Also, his study failed to adequately account for the heat-island effect, and had trouble getting published for that reason.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
How on earth does that explain the way that Bonobos (our closest relative) carry on?
The prevaling theory for the differences in behavoir between chimpanzees and bonobos, our closest relatives, is that bonobos evolved in an environment where it was not necessary to compete for food.
It's funny that you bring it up, as if the fact that we can observe different sexual behavior in other species means that human sexuality isn't as predetermined as a bonobos. Different species behave different sexually, but how they behave sexually is never a "social construct".
If you are indeed as well versed in biology as you claim, you will also recognize the bonobo as an exception, an edge case.
Do you disagree with the classification of humans as a species where males compete for females?
You're kidding me, right? Your first reply is a text book example of an ad hominem.
If you did not know that gender as a social construct in a core feminist belief, look around. Read what is being written and done under the feminist banner. It is a core belief, not a radical one.
"The Chlorine in our drinking water is strictly speaking being used as a pesticide to kill off unwanted bacteria"
Don't we use ozone now instead of chlorine?
Not sure who we is. For my part in Canada it's still Chlorine. You can actually smell it in spring time because they have to up it so much.
I just saw the report of this study... and then saw this:
Excerpt:
There is good and bad news for climate scientists. The good news: Most
Americans (79 percent) say that science and scientists are invaluable.
The bad news: On controversial topics such as climate change, a
significant number of Americans do not use science to inform their views.
Instead, they use political orientation and ideology, which are reflected
in their level of education, to decide whether humans are driving
planetary warming.
This comes from a public opinion poll released yesterday by Pew Research
Center and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).
The poll captured a significant split between what scientists and the
general public believe on climate change.
In 2014, the vast majority (87 percent) of scientists said that human
activity is driving global warming, and yet only half the American public
ascribed to that view. And 77 percent of scientists said climate change is
a very serious problem. In comparison, only 33 percent of the general
public said it was a very serious problem in a 2013 poll.
--- end excerpt ---
http: // www.scientificamerican.com/article/big-gap-between-what-scientists-say-and-americans-think-about-climate-change/
mark "confused"
A prime example of scientific knowledge vs the public's at large.
DDTs was/is one of the safest and most effective pesticides to date. While almost no real research into DDT has found any real adverse affects we do know that the ban of DDT, especially in African countries, has greatly affected infection/death rates.
Take Sri Lanka malaria rates: /year /year
pre-ban : 2.8 million+ / year
with DDT : 17
post ban : 2.5million +
In DDTs case, environmentalist pushed hard to demonize a chemical that almost all research pointed to as safe and even studies that found it to be possibly harmful in certain conditions to be the least harmful of all the alternatives.
Of course that's just my opinion...... you could be wrong!
First, you cited the Pew Research Center, which a few years back claimed that the majority of American media was "liberal" ---HUH?????
Next you said: The biggest gap between scientists and the public came on issues that may elicit fear: the safety of genetically modified (or GMO) foods (37 percent of the public said GMOs were safe, compared to 88 percent of scientists) and the use of pesticides in agriculture (28 percent of the public said foods grown with pesticides were safe to eat, versus 68 percent of scientists).
I don't give a rat's ass, and nor should anyone capable of thinking for themselves, what Neil Degrasse-Tyson, an astrophysicist, has to say about GMOs, or anyone else except for the fellow who originally created them at Monsanto, and turned into the first whistleblower on Monsanto's GMOs, and other top-level molecular biologists, etc.
Recommended reading: Open Secret by Erin Arvedlund (she's the financial reporter who wrote the first articles (back in 2001) and the number one book onr Bernie Madoff.
excellent interview here on her Bernie Madoff reporting:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
You just completely destroyed the parent poster's thesis. Bravo!!!!
Male pot plants fear me.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
The scientific response to using more biofuels plays nicely in juxtoposition to the very next /. story: http://science.slashdot.org/st...
These results simply reflect more the culture of scientists than actual science.
ôó
Because it's bollocks.
No, actually, it's quite true. Just a few examples:
Dana Nuccitelli (of Skeptical Science - an AGW support blog) is actually employed at Tetra Tech (the big oil company).
Pew Charitable Trust's Center for Climate and Energy Solutions are principally funded by Royal Dutch Shell, HP, and Entergy Corp.
The World Wildlife Foundation also received a lot of funding from Royal Dutch Shell, and John Loudon (former Shell president) actually served as the WWF president for four years.
Standard Oil's charitable arm has given millions of dollars to Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, and others.
Four companies sponsor Stanford's Global Climate and Energy Project: Exxon General Electric Sluberger (Oil Field Services company) Toyota
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
They let you spray MORE, not less.
Do you really, honestly think farmers buy Roundup Ready crops so that they can just go and spray more herbicide for the hell of it? Yes, there are herbicide resistant crops, but the systems those are used in result in the replacement of other, harsher herbicides and the promotion of soil conserving no-till methods. When you put it in context, you find that it really isn't that bad of a thing at all. If anyone's got a better viable weed control strategy, I'm the agricultural community is all ears, but until then, herbicide resistant crops are a win.
Calling you a moron is just stating a plainly observable fact.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
You could put them to work cutting your lawn with scissors.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Ok, let's cook the delicious red herrings, put them on toast, east them and get back to it.
You claimed that sexual reproduction means that men and women's brains must be different. I pointed out that there are both dimorphic and hematopoietic sexually reproducing organisms with no brains at all. Do you now recant your position that sexual reproduction must involve mental differences?
Second you claimed that male reproductive success is uncapped. I pointed our many examples where that is not in fact the case. Do you now retract that point?
I'd like to point out at this juncture that you're the one that brought all these other organisms into the debate by claiming generalities about evolutionary biology and how those generalities must affect the brain.
Next (forgive improper quoting, I'm on my phone), why should I accept that bonobis are an edge case? There is an astonishing variety in the three domains of life, far, far more than most people expect. Secondly, bonobos also share some very important sexual features work us and not chimps, such as oxytocin receptors.
And finally if you think we are a species where males compete for females exclusively, then I invite you to wander the streets of Essex late on a Friday night.
Honestly, my conclusion is that you're almost as ignorant about human behavior as you are about evolutionary biology. What's interesting is you're using your cod evolution bad science arguments while accusing others if exactly the same.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Ah-hom how? I think Inigo Montoya would like a word with you.
As for the rest, no, I simply don't believe you that it's a core belief. This is you just making shit up. That's no to say that many aspects of gender aren't purely social (pink for girls is a classic example).
But almost certainly more of gender is a social construct than you realise. AgAin the sad thing is your mindless taking against feminism hurts men because by pretending there are more differences than there really are ends up pushing many men into roles they're not happy with.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I wouldn't doubt that there are evolutionary biology studies that support it, and some that oppose it. The layman-level stuff I've seen has always looked like somebody making up a neat story to explain something. Humans are far better at making up neat stories to support what they already think than weeding through them. (Two groups can be given a description of a situation, told two different outcomes, and each group will come up with solid evidence supporting the outcome they've been told.)
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
I live in Oslo, Norway, and I would claim that even though we also have our share of wooly/wishful thinking, most Norwegians tend to believe what scientists tell them, as opposed to the US where even presidents can boast about making decisions based on their gut feeling, with no factual research.
I am an EE who has been working in the IT business since 1984, but that doesn't mean that I don't try to follow research in other fields, like physics or chemistry.
Living in Norway I know that pretty much all the electricity we use here is based on hydro power, but I realized many years ago that for humanity in general to have a sustainable future we need a lot more research into nuclear power: It comes down to either filling up a fraction of the Sahara with solar cells, or developing better reactors like the Thorium LIFTer. Burning complex hydrocarbons for power generation should be a crime, and not just due to global warming.
I'll admit that I don't like GMOs, but that is mostly due to the way the US patent systems have allowed Monsanto to patent the resulting modified genes. It was really good news when the patent on the breast cancer gene sequence was invalidated, so I do have some hope that the US will try to fix the most glaring problems.
Terje
"almost all programming can be viewed as an exercise in caching"
Other species don't typically have as well-developed and flexible societies, so they tend to have a lot more biology in their behavior and a lot less society. This is why it's worth looking at them: they show a lot of variety in mating behavior, and therefore show that biology allows a lot of different mating behavior. There are, in fact, a lot of species where males compete for females, and different species can do some wildly different things. Therefore, we know we can't predict human sexual dimorphism from the basic biology of the situation.
This means that there's no a priori reason why any particular attribute of female brains should differ from the same attribute of male brains. There may be differences, but it's really difficult to distinguish between social and biological differences.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Ignoring the fact that feminism is a really badly defined term, and that it (like every other movement) has its share of loudmouth idiots, gender is to some extent a social construct. Relations of men and women have changed considerably over the years and miles, meaning there's a lot of it that isn't biological.
As far as "social constructionism" goes, I know a lot of women who will describe themselves as feminists, I have read assorted feminist writings over the years, and I don't know what that phrase means.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
You claimed that sexual reproduction means that men and women's brains must be different. I pointed out that there are both dimorphic and hematopoietic sexually reproducing organisms with no brains at all. Do you now recant your position that sexual reproduction must involve mental differences?
Fine. There are some species of flora where this is not the case. You are right, that only applies to sexually reproducing fauna. Congratulations.
Second you claimed that male reproductive success is uncapped. I pointed our many examples where that is not in fact the case. Do you now retract that point?
No, you haven't. I don't understand how you have so little insight in the basics of sexual reproduction. The male is optimized for spreading genes, the female for producing offspring. Do you not understand that this fundamental mechanism, this division of labour, is the reason why sexual reproduction is so effective?
Let's say you as a male have a beneficial mutation. If you are a a male you could spread that to an almost infinite number of offspring. A female couldn't. That is the very purpose of The Male. That doesn't work if the male is as choosy as a female, which is why males have evolved to be less choosy.
Sure, there are some species that have adapted to other strategies, but these are edge cases in some unusual environments, and are not the norm. In the vast majority of sexually reproducing mammals, males compete for females. There is no reason, and no evidence, that humans are any different, in spite of your anecdotes from Essex.
Calling Hashead a moron is not an ad hominem attack. Saying that Hashead's arguments are stupid, so Hashead is a moron, is not an ad hominem attack. Saying that Hashead is a moron and therefore his arguments suck is an ad hominem. Also, saying that Hashead is biased, and therefore his arguments can be dismissed, is an ad hominem.
Brought to you by the Slashdot Association of Annoying Pedants.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Yeah, I don't know who that is.
If you don't believe me, then fine, but next time someone is showing you statistics of how men make more than women, think about what I said.
Yes there is reason to expect there to be differences and we can in fact observe these differences as patterns that occur across all human societies.
Males always take more risks.
Women always invest more in offspring.
Men are more interested in things, women in people.
The Blank Slate by Steve Pinker
Actually, I think it would be legal in most duristrictions. Most patent law allows an individual to make a private and non commercial copy of a patented device for private use.
Yeah, I don't know who that is.
Then hand in your nerd card at the door on the way out.
If you don't believe me, then fine, but next time someone is showing you statistics of how men make more than women, think about what I said.
So next time someone shows that I should think about how you believe that "gender is a social construct" is a core belief of feminism?
Sense! This makes none!
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Why stick to questions about non-controversial stuff. A certain number of individuals may understand things about physics, but, really, who cares? It doesn't matter. It does matter how much the Earth is warming up and what's causing it.
Scientific literacy that is thrown aside when it conflicts with ideological positions is not, I contend, science literacy so much as it is trivia collection.
Deciding matters of science by political or religious means is stupid and way unscientific. I don't really care whether people are ignoramuses or idiots or fools or liars when it comes down to the same effect.
If scientists didn't talk about anything that had political implications, then politics would be entirely based on scientific ignorance, which I do not see as desirable.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Nowhere in the article does it say that 87% of scientist believe that humans are the cause of climate change. It only reports how the average person thinks scientists believe and that is 57%.
The male is optimized for spreading genes, the female for producing offspring.
So Anglerfish don't exist? Geese don't exist? Seahorses don't exist? Snails don't exist? Albatrosses don't exist? Bees don't exist? None of those fit your cute little narritive. If you're going to make wild claims please don't make ones that fly so flagrantly in the face of facts.
Let's say you as a male have a beneficial mutation. If you are a a male you could spread that to an almost infinite number of offspring.
Unless you're one of the cases where you can't.
That doesn't work if the male is as choosy as a female,
Then why on earth do so many sepecies mate for life? Ah yes. Every case which doesn't fit your world view is an "edge case" so you can ignore it and pretent it doesn't exist.
In the vast majority of sexually reproducing mammals,
You're limiting yourself to mammals now? This is new. You earlier claimed that evoloutonary biology as a whole supported your absurd points. I guess you've finally accepted that plants don't have brains. That took you an astonishingly large number of posts to do that!
There is no reason, and no evidence, that humans are any different, in spite of your anecdotes from Essex.
Oh so apart from the cases where it's not the case and apart from the cases where humans don't exihibit the behaviour you want them to and apart from the cases where the closest relatives to humans don't exhibit those cases there's no evidence.
Well, yes, I agree. If you ignore all the evidence then there is no evidence. Convenient!
Out of interest are you also a young earth creationist?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Maybe so but in the end the scientific method overcame all of that. That's the beauty of science. There is ultimately no opinion, just reality.
Far more than you'll ever figure out.
But the scientists tell us that GMOs with pesticide in them is "safe". Not "less safe, but still safe enough". But just plain "safe". And if we choose to diafgree about what we put in our bodits, they call us anti-intellectual idiots.
Learn to love Alaska
... If you want to have a political survey then ask those questions.
if you want to have a science question that is not biased by politics then ask questions that don't have a political connotation.
Your study absent this isolation is really just looking at who is in which ideological camp. it is not a test of literacy.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
GMOs usually need far fewer pesticides sprayed on them, that is pretty much the point of them most of the time.
Nope. The term "pesticide" includes herbicide. And pretty much the point of them most of the time is to be Roundup resistant. Then sell the farmers 100x the amount of roundup you could normally use. The crops live, all the weeds die. Spray more. Spray often.
That you didn't know that the #1 product from Monsanto (the #1 maker of GMO) was designed in increase, not decrease pesticide use pretty much means that people should believe the opposite of anything you say.
Learn to love Alaska
Nope. It's $10,000 of seed, and $100,000 in manual labour picking weeds, or $50,000 in seed (GMO roundup resistant) and $50,000 in Roundup.
The second one is easier and cheaper, and much worse for the consumer and environment. Now what do you pick?
Learn to love Alaska
That isn't how knowledge works. If I KNOW something then I have KNOWledge of it. I am therefore not ignorant of it.
As to whether one group understands what science is or not... ALL ideological factions will contradict ANYTHING if it damages or undermines their ideology.
If I showed you research that welfare hurt people would people that support welfare change their minds? No. So are they science deniers?
By your logic, EVERY political faction is a science denier.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
As I pointed out in my previous post, IF you are generalizing then your generalizations are irrational. They are effectively circular logic. I pointed this out above.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Mueller was a skeptic in the true sense of the word in that he had is reservations about global warming data but when he researched it he was convinced by the evidence. That's as opposed to the many climate science deniers who like to call themselves skeptics. Most of them are "skeptical" of mainstream climate science but will wholeheartedly accept anything that appears to call it into question with no skepticism at all.
Also, his study failed to adequately account for the heat-island effect, and had trouble getting published for that reason.
I've heard nothing about problems Berkeley Earth had with the heat island effect. As I understand it the reason they had trouble getting some of their early stuff published was because it was just a repeat of stuff that had already been published by others and was therefore redundant.
First, come back when you know the difference between herbicide and pesticide.
Secondly, this isn't 1815, it's 2015. In America, we don't clear a 100 acre farm by picking weeds by hand. Maybe at one organic granola farm in the People's Republic of California, but not in the bread basket midwest, or here in Texas.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=about+pes...
Though often misunderstood to refer only to insecticides, the term pesticide also applies to herbicides, fungicides, and various other substances used to control pests.
You come back when you can define pesticide. It's a broad term that includes more than just insecticide. Even worse, you were incorrectly correcting other people.
Learn to love Alaska
What makes you think those two sentences were about scientists?
Most of them are "skeptical" of mainstream climate science but will wholeheartedly accept anything that appears to call it into question with no skepticism at all.
So.......do you also have a name for the people who wholeheartedly accept anything that appears to support it with no skepticism at all?
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
No its not harmless
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic_acid
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenoestrogen
you NEED to do more research before you post non-sense.
I wouldn't doubt that there are evolutionary biology studies that support it, and some that oppose it. The layman-level stuff I've seen has always looked like somebody making up a neat story to explain something. Humans are far better at making up neat stories to support what they already think than weeding through them.
Well indeed. I suspect there are some subtle differences of some sort, and that they must have evolved. But those glib reasons based on misunderstood versions of massively simplified takes on biology are not the reasons.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
I love this:
we can in fact observe these differences as patterns that occur across all human societies.
followed by this:
Women always invest more in offspring.
This really takes the cake. You asserted "always". That means you are denying the existence of situations where the mother buggered off leaving the father to bring up the kids. You are denying the existence of plainly observable facts.
Even relative non contraversial points you manage to get wrong:
Males always take more risks.
Nope. Men on average take more risks. If what you said was true, then if you chose a man and woman at random from the population the male would ALWAYS (your choice of word) would take more risks than the female.
You really are a moron.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
You haven't thought it through then.
Think of the presuppositions in the statement "women make less money than men, hence society treats women unfairly".
That statement only makes sense if there are no inherent differences in the brain, and so gender must be a social construct that is unfair to women.
So Anglerfish don't exist? Geese don't exist? Seahorses don't exist? Snails don't exist? Albatrosses don't exist? Bees don't exist? None of those fit your cute little narritive. If you're going to make wild claims please don't make ones that fly so flagrantly in the face of facts.
Wow. See I've tried not to insult you personally, even though you have constantly insulted me personally in your replies. You have the gall to accuse me of being ignorant of biology, and yet you are completely ignorant to basic mechanics of evolution. This stuff is evolution 101.
Exceptions exist, but despite what you SJW people like to think, and love to argue, variation does not invalidate a trend.
If the males purpose is not to spread genes, why do males exist? If that is not their purpose, why has this system where only half the population are capable of producing offspring evolved?
Oh so apart from the cases where it's not the case and apart from the cases where humans don't exihibit the behaviour you want them to and apart from the cases where the closest relatives to humans don't exhibit those cases there's no evidence.
You're confusing "evidence" and "data" with "anecdotes". They are not the same thing.
Fucking moron.
Dang it, you're right. Now that's the eighth time I've been wrong.
From the context it is very clear that by "always" i mean all societies showed these trends.
You would only need to explicitly state that for an idiot of your caliber.
From the context it is very clear that by "always" i mean all societies showed these trends.
lolno. If you hadn't spouted ignorant crap about evolution and sexual reproduction I might have given you the benefit of the doubt. I mean you claimed that "evoloutionary biology" must mean that mens and womens brains are different "because of sexual selction". You actually managed to ignore possily the majority of species which reproduce sexually to come to that conclusion.
You clearly are ignorant about a great many things so it would be illogical narrte in correct meanings for your ramblings.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Answer my questions in the post above, coward.
Though if you think it will "only" be .05% then your ignorance is leaving mine in the dust.
Wow. See I've tried not to insult you personally, even though you have constantly insulted me personally in your replies.
Well ,I didn't until you accused me of ad-hom. I figured I may as well earn tha accusation. Besides in that I'm insulting your awful arguments.
This stuff is evolution 101.
Oh god. The trouble with any 101 course is that it is necessarily a massive simplification of what's going on. If all you're relying on is evolution 101, you're going to be making all sorts of mistakes.
Look, it's simple. You claimed as a universal truth that males can breed more or less without limit. I've given you a number of counter examples where this is not true. I can give you more if you like. Counterexamples prove 100% that your claim is not, in fact a universal truth.
If it's not a nuiversal truth then the logic of "it's a universal truth so it impies this about humans" is flawed.
variation does not invalidate a trend.
But you weren't talking about a trend. You were referring to it as a universal truth and deducing form that how it must necessarily affect humans. If it's only a trend, the the most you can say about humans is that "in the absence of any other information it's more likely they fit the trend than not".
That is a vastly weaker argument than the one you were making. Let me remind you that you were dismissing all of feminism because of evoloutionary biology (o your 101 level understanding of it).
If the males purpose is not to spread genes, why do males exist? If that is not their purpose, why has this system where only half the population are capable of producing offspring evolved?
You think I'm claiming that the purpose of the male is to not spread genes? My gosh you are going up the wrong alley. The purpose of the male, in as much as purpose exists at all---which it doesn't, is on a very coarse level exactly the same as the female. That is, to spread genes.
The reason you're barking up the wrong tree is that you believe that this is a trivial first order effect where naturally the male needs t ohave as many offspring in a given generation as possible. Which is clearly not the case.
The species that survive continue to successfully propagate over many, many generations. There are many adaptations to this. Quite a few involve the males not behaving as you insist they must. Else, how would it have evolved?
You're confusing "evidence" and "data" with "anecdotes". They are not the same thing.
Ah, so evidence to the contrary of your claims, i.e. species which don't fit your narritive are just anecdotes? To say you are blinkered is a quite astonishing underststement. You are intent on ignoring/dismissing/discounting every bit of evidence that doesn't fit how you believe the world works.
Geese are real things.
Anglerfish are real things.
Praying mantises are real things.
Snails are real things.
Plants are real things.
Albatrosses are real things.
Bees are real.
Wasps are real.
Ants are real.
Termites are real.
Huge varieties of fish are real things.
If you igore all the scientific evidence which doesn't fit your theory, the your theory is nothing more than a flawed notion.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Answer my questions in the post above, coward.
sure.
From the context it is very clear that by "always" i mean all societies showed these trends. You would only need to explicitly state that for an idiot of your caliber.
uh... you know, it's not cowardly to not answer a question which doesn't exist. Tell you what, if you actually pose a question rather than mandlessly blather about biology all while revealing your own ignorance, then I'll gladly answer it.
But you have to, you know, actualy pose a question first!
SJW n. One who posts facts.
Like I said before, saying always was wrong. It isn't always the case, just like 99% of the time. Can we please talk about the 99% bucket now, or do you still want to keep harping of the 1%?
Do you also disagree with the statement "Americans speak English"? I mean you could probably name a lot of Americans who don't speak English.
It's called generalizing, and although you people think that is evil, it's actually a necessary tool. If something is true for an overwhelming majority of a selection, it is correct to say it is true for that selection. That statement is not the equivalent of saying "Absolutely every single american speaks English.
I'm done now. You're not debating the issue, but rather debating semantics and using straw men arguments to argue absolutes. I'm guessing you don't actually know what a straw man argument is either.
The male is optimized for spreading genes, the female for producing offspring.
So Anglerfish don't exist? Geese don't exist? Seahorses don't exist? Snails don't exist? Albatrosses don't exist? Bees don't exist? None of those fit your cute little narritive. If you're going to make wild claims please don't make ones that fly so flagrantly in the face of facts.
You are disagreeing with me here. Later, you claimed to never have opposed this statement.
I love how you switch between generalities and specifics as if I won't notice. You were using your reasoning to infer things about the differences between men and women. At least you've finally admitted that you're claims are not universal. Now you should admit that therefore you cannot use those claims to prove things about humans.
To reuse your analogy, your claims are like you trying to prove that an American appeals English without bothering to check. Sure, he probably does, but you can't be 100% sure. So, your original claim that evolutionary biology disproves feminism is equally shaky.
As for you ragequitting, didn't you accuse me of cowardice for not skewering a question of yours? How is this any different?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
That's a reference to the climate science deniers in the previous sentence. More specifically someone whose ideology drives them to be "skeptical" of some scientific knowledge but who will uncritically accept something that appears to support their position even though usually they're just misinterpreting what was said. As an example they hear the news that Antarctic sea ice is increasing in extent lately and automatically assume that means it must be getting colder therefore no global warming. They never bother to dig deeper into the scientific research about it.
Sure, there are such people. Do you also recognize that there are AGW 'supporters' who uncritically accept everything that supports their opinion? Do you have a term for them, or do you only label people who disagree with you?
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Of course there are. They like climate science deniers are unscientific ideologues. When I have the opportunity I try to point out their failures as well. The science it what it is and is not subject to political arguments from either side.
3a: Probably not.
1-2 years of research/development
2 lots of 9 months of pregnancy (1.5 years)
2.5-3.5 years
If the child waits till they are 16 and 1/2 years old the patent will expire.
My Transformation Website
Kindle Books http://www.catprog.org/rev
Interactive CYOA http://www.catprog.org/st
If something is true for 99% percent of all species it is reasonable to think that it is also true for humans.
Not at all. If that was the case it would be reasonable to think that humans aren't tool users, humans don't build stuff etc etc.
If you're coming across a new species and have no other information it might be reasonable to start by weakly assuming the most likely things given what 99% of other species do.
However, insisting on sticking to that (what Hashead is doing) when there's evidence to the contrary and you know the assumptsions don't represent universal truth (as he initially claimed), would be a vewy silly thing to do indeed.
Humans are the most observed species ever, you don't generally need to take guesses by extrapolating from other species to fill in the gaps.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
In the case of tool use there is evidence that humans are an exception.
we're the best tool users, but there are others. Apes, crows, sea otters, egyptian vultures, to name a few.
When it comes to gender roles there is no such evidence. Your turn to provide a citation, as I've already provided a citation for my claim. And please no anecdotes, as you seem to erroneously equate anecdotes with evidence.
You can't just bleat "anecdote is not data" and make the data go away. As some point a bunch of observations is data. There are innumeral examples where the general trends don't hold, including our closest relatives.
If the general trends are not universal truths, then they're nothing more than useful starting points. You can't prove anything by saying they exist.
My claim is that your original argument that "There is a huge gap between what we know about sex and gender from science, and what people generally believe about sex and gender." is fundementally flawed. I can't provide a specific citation to that because noone else has argued it with you.
To be honest I'm not even sure which points you're trying to argue any more.
I still disagree that feminism is responsible for everything wrong we know about gender (this is trivial to disprove). I also disagree that the existence of sexual reproduction proves that men and women must have different brains.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
You can't just bleat "anecdote is not data" and make the data go away. As some point a bunch of observations is data.
My god, you are a special kind of stupid. There is a fundamental difference between anecdotes and evidence. A scientific study with a large enough selection size is evidence, like my reference.
I can't provide a specific citation to that because noone else has argued it with you.
You can't provide a citation for your claim that there is evidence that supports the idea that human gender roles are exceptions from the norm because "noone[sic] has argued it with me"?
When we finally got past all your insults, straw man arguments, semantic gymnastics and logical fallacies, you actually made a falsifiable claim about the issue. Well done!
However, insisting on sticking to that (what Hashead is doing) when there's evidence to the contrary
You need a Citation for the bolded claim. If you cannot produce it then you have lost the debate and we are done here.
From someone actively involved with trying maintain a federal grant at work, you're simply mistaken on both counts. The federal grant covers the salaries of the people involved with that project. No grant means no project. No project means the jobs go away.
The grant is for renewable terms. WithIN the current term, continued funding is dependant on hitting certain specified targets, as measured by the officials at federal agency making the grant. At renewal time, renewal is 100% at the discretion of the federal officials. They can cancel our team and send the grant money elsewhere at their complete discretion.
I never understood why people completing make stuff up, fabricating it out of whole cloth, and post it as if it were fact. Go ahead AMD do it again, if you must, and when I'm in the office on Monday I'll post the grant documents, "at sole discretion" wording and all, and you'll just look like an utter fool.
There is a fundamental difference between anecdotes and evidence. A scientific study with a large enough selection size is evidence, like my reference
Meh. Firstly, observation is the core of science. Secondly one only needs a single counterexample to disprove a claim along the lines of the ones you made.
You keep mentioning your reference, but you never say what's in it. The way citing normally works is something along the lines of:
there is an arument which says blah blah blah[cite].
Or
there is data[cite] which implies blah blah clah.
The way you don't cite something is: I'm right because [cite].
You can't provide a citation for your claim that there is evidence that supports the idea that human gender roles are exceptions from the norm because "noone[sic] has argued it with me"?
Nope, despite your claims that I'm a special kind of stupid, you're the one who appears to be unable to read. Try going back and reading what I wrote. You'd look an awful lot silly if you argued against real points rather than making up ones you prefer.
Anyway, what we can observe is the following:
Humans are largely, but not exclusively serially monagmous.
Humans usually, but not always couple up and raisd offspring as a pair, where both adults pool resources to raise children.
Sometimes this doesn't work and the mother is left to raise the children alone.
Sometimes (more rarely) that doesn't work and a father raises the children alone.
Sometimes, neither works and humans collectively pool resources to raise children.
That is what we can observe. What is your point?
the thing is you can't even decide if you're talking about eukariotes, animalia, craniates, vertibrates, mammals, or great apes. You keep swinging wildly between different ones cherry picking the stories that best fit what you already believe.
So how about you choose here and now which gender roles you consider the norm. You have to chose any one of the following, otherwise you're just cherry picking:
Homo
Hominini
Hominidae
Hominoidea
Primates
Placental mammals
Mammals
Amniotes
Stem land animals
Lobe-finned fish
Bony fish
Vertibrates
Craniates
Chordates
Deuterostomia
Animalia
Eukariotes
All life
So which is it? Which subgrouping are you going to chose to define "gender norms", and why do you think it is more valid than the supergroup or subgroup.
Until you define a grouping, then your claims of "gender norms" are more or less meaningless.
You need a Citation for the bolded claim.
There was no bolded claim. Would you care to restate?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
No, your anecdotes hold precisely zero value as evidence, you moron.
You keep mentioning your reference, but you never say what's in it. The way citing normally works is something along the lines of:
Complete bullshit. I have made several falsifiable claims and they are all documented in The Blank Slate.
That is what we can observe. What is your point?
We can also observe the following across all cultures
Women always invest more in offspring.
Men always take more risks
Women are more interested in people, men in things.
These are some of the falsifiable claims I have made, and provided citations for. All consistent with my claims about human gender roles. And don't even think of pulling that all/none always/never bullshit again.
the thing is you can't even decide if you're talking about eukariotes, animalia, craniates, vertibrates, mammals, or great apes. You keep swinging wildly between different ones cherry picking the stories that best fit what you already believe.
No, I've stated that by the very nature of sexual reproduction the males job is to spread genes, the females to produce offspring. Don't even think about arguing this, as you explicitly stated that you agree with this in a previous post.
You claimed I believed all this in spite of evidence to the contrary. You have not produced any evidence to the contrary, but rather argued that your anecdotes are sufficient to disprove peer reviewed meta studies, like the borderline mentally challenged moron that you are.
Unless you can provide a link to this alleged evidence, I consider this debate won - and you a complete fucking tool.
You seem on poor terms with the muse of language. I take it that you mean "usually" when you say always. Well, I know you do because we argued round this circle before. Debating with you is difficult because you lack precision in your language and so your points come across as very confused.
Women always invest more in offspring.
Most kids get raised as part of a family. that seems very much like pooling resources to me.
I've stated that by the very nature of sexual reproduction the males job is to spread genes, the females to produce offspring.
And producing offspring isn't spreading genes? The purpose of sexual reproduction is to spread genes.
Don't even think about arguing this, as you explicitly stated that you agree with this in a previous post.
Nope.
You claimed I believed all this in spite of evidence to the contrary.
What evidence?
You have not produced any evidence to the contrary, but rather argued that your anecdotes are sufficient to disprove peer reviewed meta studies
what peer reviewed metastudies? You never gave any, you merely asserted they existed.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
For fuck sake you god damn moron, how many times do I have to tell you: IT'S DOCUMENTED IN THE BOOK! A book detailing the available evidence is acceptable as evidence by any standard. Your fucking moronic opinions and anecdotes are not.
You don't want to invest the time to examine the available data? Fine, but then you forfeit the right to argue against it. I'd tell you to read the book, but it's clear the book is way beyond your level of comprehension, since there are very few pictures in it.
You have not provided any citations for your claim, so I have won this debate, and you have once again proved you have the intellect of an 11 year old.
For fuck sake you god damn moron, how many times do I have to tell you: IT'S DOCUMENTED IN THE BOOK!
You have indeed told me "it" many times, but you haven't told me what. WHAT evidence is documented in the book. You have the opportunity to spell it out in brief right here:
[blank space]
I doubt every argument you made is documented in the book, so please at least tell me which. You don't seem to realse that "go and read 3 books first" is a reasonable debating strategy, especially when the person debating with you is at least as well versed in the topics at hand.
If you said "there is evidence [cite book]" or something along those lines, then I'd accept your argument. However, what you do is ramble in circles and then demand I read three books (with insults no less!), then ramble round in circles when I ask you to say what your arguments are (citations are no substitute for having your own arguments) and so on.
I like how you have repeatedly, "cowardly" refesed to answer any of my questions, suc has which grouping you are using to define your gender norms.
You have not provided any citations for your claim
I don't think you nuderstand how debating and reasoning works. The logic and reason part should stand on its own without citations. If you want to skip over an established piece of reasoning, you might say something like "following the argument in [cite]", though that's not done when the argument is the central part of the debate. Citations are also used to provide coroborating evidence.
The only bits of evidence I've presented are that there are in fact various organisms which don't fit your narritive of gender roles. Would you like to provide citations for those?
Demanding citations for my logical arguments (which is not how citations work) makes it appear that you can't rebut my arguments and are trying to rely (incorrectly I might add) on technicalities to make yourself happy ignoring them.
so I have won this debate
If you like. Will it make you happy if I agree?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
"People are not patentable. " .....yet
"People are not patentable. " .....yet
And corporations are people.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.