Douglas Adams apparently gave them a fond write up in 'Last Chance to See'.
Incidentally, rats have been one of the major predators contributing to their decline in number.
There's got to be a spectrum here somewhere - you can't just go and do anything to please your partner/family/friends/peers etc.
If your partner asks you for something that you take issue with it's being honest and responsible to explain your issue. Granted there are ways of doing these things sensitively, but there *are* some things that are unwise (unsustainable etc) and that should be denied, no matter who's feelings you hurt.
The D-Generation (Australian comedy group) did this sketch about 10-15 years ago on their Late Show:
The first blade distracts the hair, while the second and third blades sneak up behind it, cutting off any escape routes. The fourth and fifth blades attempt to coax the hair from its hiding place using modern counselling techniques while the sixth blade, posing as a passing motorist, acts as a decoy, allowing the seventh and eighth blades to swoop down and quickly overpower the hair. The ninth blade, disguised as a postman, administers a small dose of chloroform, allowing blades 10 through 13 to remove the hair and escort it away for further questioning. The 14th blade informs the hair of its rights. The 15th blade handles the paperwork and the 16th blade, well, it's just along for the ride.
I'm not sure about the US shows, but here in Australia the D-Generation (local comedy group) did a sketch like this about 10-15 years ago on The Late Show.
Someone posted the text here:
http://forums.eyo.com.au/showpost.php?p=656956&pos tcount=13
Nah, to make it really interesting they should base it on Alchemist's rendition of 'The Eve of the War' from Jeff Wayne's version. That would totally r0XX0r, eh Tim?:)
First post - yeah well you've gotta start somewhere I suppose.
I was talking from the standards of validation of each particular science - and even from that perspective, Global Warming is a big maybe even qualitatively. Please have a look at some of the papers in that area and you would notice the number of unknowns.
How can you even claim to understand something on which you have such limited data on, where half the variables are assumed and the other half inadequately gathered? In fact, if the supporters of Global Warming were to accept their data as such, I'd have absolutely no objection whatsoever. But they claim the data to be conclusive, when it clearly is not.
Agreed, if this were true (claiming the data to be absolutely conclusive) it would be bad science indeed, but I'm sceptical as to how many professional scientists get to (or maintain) their positions by making forthright proclamations. It's obviously not what science is (supposed to be) about. I suppose they are out there though.
And your example of physics is quite flawed primarily because theories in physics are not well accepted until they are proven.
I hope you were just being brief here, otherwise I might suggest you brush up your Popper;) I was not trying to indicate that physics is in a shambles, but on the contrary that the presence of dispute is indicative of the health of science. I understand the generally conservative approach in physics, but physics has the luxury of being able to run experiments in most areas. How do you run an experiment in atmospheric science? Probabaly the same way you do it in astrophysics - you run big number crunching simulations built upon a fair few assumptions. Are you similarly sceptical about the use of such simulations in physics? I doubt it, but I suppose this is still not the main point.
Obviously, the reason people are going out on a limb scientifically (if you are correct about the state of the evidence) is that global warming is potentially planet threatening. Surely caution here is a good thing?
Global Warming reminds me quite strongly of yet another doomsday theory that quietly faded away into oblivion - Nuclear Winter.
I'm not really knowledgeable in this area, however this a really poor analogy to use as contributory to an argument. If nuclear winter theories have faded into the background this would have to be because of the thawing of the cold war. It's probably not very authoritative, but wikipedias entry on nuclear winter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter) does not indicate that the theories have been falsified, merely that they remain controversial. They just aren't as critical anymore. Besides, we would have to have a global nuclear war (are you keen?) to test the theories anyway. On the other hand, the proposed causal mechanism for this current 'doomsday theory' is already in effect, and has been for a couple of centuries, ie the experiment has already started. As good scientists we have to monitor the experiment very carefully, and pull the plug if things go haywire.
That said, I would like to know what part of my comment you felt was not constructive. I was merely offering an opinion, and even validated my position. Being constructive does not mean I need to agree with the topic at hand.
Things like 'if their science were not such make-believe' sound really bad - or are you being a bit facetious? It just makes you sound like you know everything and you think everyone else is dumbass - not a way to make friends, but then you are a physicist;)
I'm a scientist too, a physicist to be exact. In my line of work, theories like this would get thrown out of the window and would shame you for life. I'm surprised how easy it is for environmentalists, geophysicists, climatologists and the like to come up with half-baked theories with partial basis and get away with it.
I may be mishearing you, but this sounds a bit like the scientific superiority that students of the 'hard' sciences (maths, physics, chemistry) have for the 'soft' sciences (biology, geology, psychology). When I was at uni studying physics I used to look down my nose at the soft sciences and think that it was all flimsy rubbish by comparison - not like good 'ol physics! We had the tighest theories, the highest levels of precision, the highest reproducibility, the smallest error bars, the grandest LAWS!!
Try working in another area of science (biology, climatology or whatever) and see how it's done before you go trashing it. I have a strictly undergrad knowledge of these things, but science is just done done differently in other areas, with different standards of validation. Yes the standards are higher in physics, but that (I believe) is because of the nature of its science - ie the things it is trying to measure that are significantly more measurable.
As a physicist you should know that there are areas of physics with similar levels of dispute (eg copenhagen / many worlds interpretations of QM) that do not preclude practical work being done. On the other hand as a physicist, I doubt you have to deal with systems that are quite as complex as those ones (environmental, geophysical, climatological) that are keen to cast doubt on. Let the real experts in their area do their work, and please do try to be constructive!
Slashdot Mirror
http://www.progressquest.com/ provides hours and hours of fun and only has one control - Alt+F4 ;)
For another bit of NZ fauna trivia:
All of the remaining 80-odd kakapo (endangered NZ flightless parrot http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakapo) are known by name: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Kakapo
Douglas Adams apparently gave them a fond write up in 'Last Chance to See'. Incidentally, rats have been one of the major predators contributing to their decline in number.
There's got to be a spectrum here somewhere - you can't just go and do anything to please your partner/family/friends/peers etc.
If your partner asks you for something that you take issue with it's being honest and responsible to explain your issue. Granted there are ways of doing these things sensitively, but there *are* some things that are unwise (unsustainable etc) and that should be denied, no matter who's feelings you hurt.
I'm not sure about the US shows, but here in Australia the D-Generation (local comedy group) did a sketch like this about 10-15 years ago on The Late Show. Someone posted the text here: http://forums.eyo.com.au/showpost.php?p=656956&pos tcount=13
Nah, to make it really interesting they should base it on Alchemist's rendition of 'The Eve of the War' from Jeff Wayne's version. That would totally r0XX0r, eh Tim? :)
Obviously, the reason people are going out on a limb scientifically (if you are correct about the state of the evidence) is that global warming is potentially planet threatening. Surely caution here is a good thing?
I'm not really knowledgeable in this area, however this a really poor analogy to use as contributory to an argument. If nuclear winter theories have faded into the background this would have to be because of the thawing of the cold war. It's probably not very authoritative, but wikipedias entry on nuclear winter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_winter) does not indicate that the theories have been falsified, merely that they remain controversial. They just aren't as critical anymore. Besides, we would have to have a global nuclear war (are you keen?) to test the theories anyway. On the other hand, the proposed causal mechanism for this current 'doomsday theory' is already in effect, and has been for a couple of centuries, ie the experiment has already started. As good scientists we have to monitor the experiment very carefully, and pull the plug if things go haywire. Things like 'if their science were not such make-believe' sound really bad - or are you being a bit facetious? It just makes you sound like you know everything and you think everyone else is dumbass - not a way to make friends, but then you are a physicist
Try working in another area of science (biology, climatology or whatever) and see how it's done before you go trashing it. I have a strictly undergrad knowledge of these things, but science is just done done differently in other areas, with different standards of validation. Yes the standards are higher in physics, but that (I believe) is because of the nature of its science - ie the things it is trying to measure that are significantly more measurable.
As a physicist you should know that there are areas of physics with similar levels of dispute (eg copenhagen / many worlds interpretations of QM) that do not preclude practical work being done. On the other hand as a physicist, I doubt you have to deal with systems that are quite as complex as those ones (environmental, geophysical, climatological) that are keen to cast doubt on. Let the real experts in their area do their work, and please do try to be constructive!