"The meaning of the world is the separation of wish and fact." - KURT GÖDEL
"According to Peirce's doctrine of fallibilism, the conclusions of science are always tentative. The rationality of the scientific method does not depend on the certainty of its conclusions, but on its self-corrective character: by continued application of the method science can detect and correct its own mistakes, and thus eventually lead to the discovery of truth".
A guiding principle for accepting claims of catastrophic global events, miracles, incredible healing, invisible friends, or fill in the blank is:
“extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” - Carl Sagan
"Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable." - H. L. Mencken
I would add irrational and highly delusional to the mix when faith requires one to accept magical violations of the well known, well tested or easily demonstrated laws of Nature. - PWL
"Science is Progress and the Future. Faith is regression to the Dark Ages." - PWL
“It pays to keep an open mind, but not so open your brains fall out.” - Carl Sagan
"It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." - Carl Sagan
"Two important characteristics of maps should be noticed. A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness." - Alfred Korzybski
"Science is a search for basic truths about the Universe, a search which develops statements that appear to describe how the Universe works, but which are subject to correction, revision, adjustment, or even outright rejection, upon the presentation of better or conflicting evidence." - James Randi
"Hypotheses are nets: only he who casts will catch." - Novalis
"Nullius in verba. Take no one's word for it." - Motto of the Royal Society
"I'm trying to find out NOT how Nature could be, but how Nature IS." - Richard Feynman
"The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin." - Thomas Henry Huxley
“A foolish faith in authority is the worst enemy of truth.” Albert Einstein
"Science is empirical. Knowing the answer means nothing. Testing your knowledge means everything." - Lawrence Krauss
"Skepticism is the agent of reason against organized irrationalism - and is therefore one of the keys to human social and civic decency." - Stephen Jay Gould
"Science is best defined as a careful, disciplined, logical search for knowledge about any and all aspects of the universe, obtained by examination of the best available evidence and always subject to correction and improvement upon discovery of better evidence. What's left is magic. And it doesn't work." - James Randi
“Tel-Aviv University demos quantum superconductors locked in a magnetic field.”
This is a kind of Tractor Beam where the beam is the magnetic field of permanent magnets and a superconducting material. It’s quite impressive aspect of Quantum Mechanics operating at a macro scale, something we’re not used to seeing. It’s the “locking” aspect that is fantastic. Of course this raises many questions about what applications are posisble.
First let’s watch the recent demo that’s been spreading like wildfire.
Now for more indepth videos that get a little bit into the science.
Going beyond the small dream of Occupy Wall Street; embrace a real dream: we are already occupying the Earth, soon the Moon and then onto the goal of occupying the entire Solar System! A worthy goal for the various space programs of Earth.
The NASA director gives 54 minute talk on occupying the solar system.
Dr S.Pete Worden, Director of NASA Ames Research Park, NASA’s cutting edge research base in Silicon Valley, discusses humanity’s goal of settling the solar system.
It ain’t over till the fat lady Neutrina sings again in a number of encore performances around the world, aka “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” (to borrow a principle from Carl Sagan).
A quick summary of the alleged discovery of slightly faster than light neutrinos:
CERN’s Antonio Ereditato does a brief BBC Inteview.
“[The following] is the live Webcast from CERN on Friday September 23, 2011. Given the potential far-reaching consequences of the OPERA experiment — which observes a neutrino beam from CERN 730 km away at Italy’s INFN Gran Sasso Laboratory, indicating that the neutrinos travel at a velocity 20 parts per million above the speed of light — independent measurements are needed before the effect can either be refuted or firmly established, according to a CERN statement just issued. The OPERA collaboration has therefore decided to open the result to broader scrutiny.” Read the rest of this entry »
“Wonders of the Universe is a 2011 television series produced by the BBC, Discovery Channel, and Science Channel, hosted by physicist Brian Cox. Wonders of the Universe was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 6 March 2011. The series comprises four episodes, each of which focuses on an aspect of the universe and features a ‘wonder’ relevant to the theme. It follows on from Cox’s previous series for the BBC, Wonders of the Solar System, which was first broadcast in 2010.” [1] Read the rest of this entry »
Looking back in time at the Mean Sea Level graphs from the University of Colorado I noticed some things that bother me about their graphs and the manner of their presentation. Some serious questions where raised.
I made this slow 2 second blink comparison movie (it speeds up at the end) of two graphs from sealevel.colorado.edu to visually compare a noticeable change in plotting and data from 20041119 and about a month later on 20041223. The graph format changed and possibly the data points where changed or deleted.
2002 Coral Doomsday Claim is Falsified by Observational Data
The Doomsday Claim: World’s Coral: 40% gone by 2010. “Across the world, coral reefs are turning into marine deserts. It’s estimated that more than a quarter have been lost and that 40 per cent could be gone by 2010.”
Doomsday Claim Validation/Falsification Test: Check the current amount of Coral in the world for 2011. If the coral has dropped by 40% or more or thereabouts the claim is validated and coral doomsday might have arrived, however if the level of coral in 2010 or after has not dropped as predicted the coral doomsday claim is falsified, null and void.
The benefits of carbon dioxide supplementation on plant growth and production within the greenhouse environment have been well understood for many years. Carbon Dioxide (CO2) is an essential component of Carbon Based Life on Earth.
There would be NO GREEN without the ESSENTIAL NUTRIENT CO2. MORE CO2 = MORE PLANTS. Inconvenient FACTS of PLANT BIOLOGY. More CO2 = More Plants = Cleaner Air. More CO2 = Plants = More Food For Humans. More CO2 = A Good Thing.
GROWING MORE PLANTS WITH CO2 IN GREENHOUSES TODAY
“The benefits of carbon dioxide supplementation on plant growth and production within the greenhouse environment have been well understood for many years. Read the rest of this entry »
The Pioneer Spacecraft: Pioneer 10 now soars toward the constellation Taurus, and 11 aims for Aquila
Thirty years ago, NASA scientists noticed that two of their spacecraft, Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11, were veering off course slightly, as if subject to a mysterious, unknown force. In 1998, the wider scientific community got wind of that veering—termed the Pioneer anomaly—and took aim at it with incessant, mind-blowingly detailed scrutiny that has since raised it to the physics equivalent of cult status. Now, though, after spawning close to 1000 academic papers, numerous international conferences, and many entire scientific careers, this beloved cosmic mystery may be on its way out.
Slava Turyshev, a scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., and Viktor Toth, a Canada-based software developer, plan to publish the results of their strikingly comprehensive new analysis of the Pioneer anomaly in the next few months. Their work is likely to bring a conclusion to one of the longest and most tumultuous detective stories of modern astrophysics.
NASA launched Pioneer 10 in the spring of 1972 and Pioneer 11 one year later. The spacecraft’s joint mission was to gather information about the asteroid belt, Jupiter, Saturn (in the case of Pioneer 11), and their moons. As they hurtled past those various celestial objects, the probes measured previously unknown properties of their atmospheres and surfaces; they also photographed Jupiter’s Red Spot and Saturn’s rings up close for the first time. Then, after completing their “flyby” missions in the mid-1970s, the Pioneers kept going. Carrying identical plaques depicting a man and a woman, the atomic transition of hydrogen, and the location of our planet within the galaxy—a message to aliens—the probes became the first manmade objects ever to plunge beyond the solar system into the inconceivable cold and dark of interstellar space. [1]
This is a fascinating story for many reasons: (1) it has parallels to the entire climate debate, (2) complex computer models of various forces of Nature such as gravity and heat, (3) 1,000s of scientific papers peer reviewed none-the-less attempting to find the cause of the anomaly, (4) destruction of the data (almost), (5) refutation upon refutation leading nowhere, (6) a mystery of great complexity, (7) models that are just to inefficient or full of errors, (8) mistaken idea after mistaken idea, (9) complexity, (10) tenacious independent non-official scientific oriented people dedicated to solving the problem on their own time, (11) …, (N) the list of valuable comparisons goes on and on. Read the rest of this entry »
The legal right of the government to lie to the people has always bothered me as it smacks of a lack of integrity by the very people allegedly empowered to have the highest levels of integrity and honesty by the people. The members of the government, in whatever capacity or role they are filling, have a special trust to uphold and when they use deception why are they allowed to get away with it and yet a different standard is applied to the people when they lie? If a defendant in a court case lies at any point while being investigated it’s treated with such great importance that it’s as if the world came to an end… but when the cult members of the cult of government lie it’s for the benefit of the people and lifted up as somehow an honorable trick that was played to get at the truth when in fact it’s no different for it was a lie, a deception, a non-truth, falsified information, a fabrication designed to give false impressions. It’s ironic that some of the best liars are likely working within the government and get rewarded for it.
“To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact.” – Charles Darwin
Reprint from the NZ CLIMATE TRUTH NEWSLETTER NO 257, NOVEMBER 28th 2010.
ANATOMY OF CLIMATE FRAUD
by Vincent Gray
Environmentalists believe that humans are destroying the earth (or as they prefer to call it,“the planet”), and they routinely manipulate news items that can be distorted to support their views. “Resources” are being “depleted”, oil is about to run out, everything is about to become extinct, all chemicals are “toxic” and all human activities must be prevented because they “damage the environment”
The “greenhouse effect” was a golden opportunity to blame every climate event on humans and prevent many classes of industrial activity.
The “greenhouse effect is a real physical phenomenon, although it has nothing to do with what happens in a greenhouse. A greenhouse inhibits convection and confines the air warned by contact with the ground that has been heated by the sun’s radiation.
The “greenhouse effect” results from absorption of part of the infra red radiation from the earth by several trace gases in the atmosphere, causing an increase in the surface temperature of the earth,
In order to show that there are increases in this effect caused by humans which are damaging the climate several propositions had to be proved.
• Greenhouse gases are increasing because of human activity
• The temperature of the earth is increasing
• This rise is damaging the climate
• Future changes can be predicted to be disastrous
Derren Brown, illusionist, “travelled to the United States to try to convince five leading figures that he had powers in their particular field of expertise: Christian evangelism, alien abduction, psychic powers, New Age theories and contacting the dead. Read the rest of this entry »
1d) 0.96 Pacific PDO + Atlantic AMO Ocean + Solar Activity v.s. Temperature.
2) While CO2 has increased in the last 50 years the 130 yr temp linear+cyclic tiny upward tend remains unchanged based upon observational data.
“Observed Global Yearly Mean Temperature Anomaly (GMTA) from the Climate Research Unit (CRU) of the Hadley Centre.” from Predictions Of Global Mean Temperatures & IPCC Projections, by Girma Orssengo, B. Tech, MASc, PhD. [See 2d].
2a) The correlation between CO2 and Temperature [1a] is very weak at 0.44 and certainly does not show causation. The central claim of catastrophic climate alarmism is falsified by the actual temperature and CO2 observations in Nature.
2b) Put another way, for seventy or so years the temperature was rising slightly with a linear and cyclic trend, then as we pumped CO2 into the atmosphere in increasing amounts since after WWII that same slight linear and cyclic trend continued unchanged.
2c) As a result of this, Nature falsifies the alarmists claims, including their IPCC climate model predictions. Read the rest of this entry »
“Adnan Oktar (born Ankara, February 2, 1956), also known by his pen name, Harun Yahya, is a Turkish proponent of Islamic creationism, anti-Zionism,[1] and, more particularly, supports Old Earth creationism.[2][3] Oktar denounces Zionism as racism and Freemasonry, and Darwinism as the source of terrorism.[4] He has created controversies in the past few years by sending out thousands of unsolicited texts advocating Islam and creationism to schools and colleges in several European countries and USA.[3][5] Oktar had defended his views by litigation; he is responsible for the blocking of numerous, high-profile Web sites in Turkey. Read the rest of this entry »
”Faith is belief in the absence of evidence, science is belief in the presence of evidence.” ‘When the evidence disagrees with a scientific proposition, the proposition is discarded. When the evidence disagrees with a religious proposition, the evidence is thrown out’. – Victor J. Stenger
I work to eliminate belief and faith from my life, now I’m not talking about the “belief” that I left my car parked in it’s spot and whether or not it’s still there, I know I left it there but it’s possible that it is no longer there for a variety of reasons all possible within the known limits of objective reality. I’m talking about the kind of belief and faith that asserts “truths” or “facts” or “aspects” of the objective reality of Nature, about the very nature of Nature itself without any evidence to stand on. That is the kind of belief and faith that is the most pernicious and dangerous. I prefer knowledge that can be verified or proven with hard evidence or even better, proven with experiment done by yourself.
The problem is that the word “belief” has SO many meanings and people often don’t mean the same thing by the word. In addition when talking with “believers” it’s a huge pile of dogma that you’re taking about when you use the word “belief”, it’s not just one belief.
The point Stegner is making is which determines what you accept as real, the faith based beliefs and dogma, or the hard evidence? If the beliefs and dogma determine what is real, that is religion, that is highly dangerous, that is what leads to delusions. If the evidence determines what is real that is science, that is rationality, that is being connected with the objective reality of Nature where we actually exist.
Of course it all hinges on what the evidence is. There is good evidence and then there is bad evidence and faulty proofs. Read the rest of this entry »
What happens after you die? Nature is a harsh mistress indeed.
What happens after death is very clear, your body rots as it’s being recycled by Nature and “you” are permanently and utterly obliterated… you cease to be… no magical heaven, no roasting hell, you just cease to be… when your brain stops working… that’s it… nothing more.
What happens when you take something apart, such as a car? As you begin to remove non-critical pieces it’s still a car, you can take the roof off and it’s still a car, you can take the hub caps off and it’s still a car, you can even take the doors off and it’s still a car; taking the wheels off and while it’s still a car it’s now a disabled car… but at some point as you remove parts – critical parts – it’s no longer a car; and if as you take those parts off the car and destroy them so there is no chance of putting it back together either… that’s what happens with humans and other living things… at some point a critical component or critical components are removed or cease functioning that are critical for it to be alive and that’s it… that is the moment you cease to be – when your brain stops functioning, just like a car ceases to be….
Now to be sure, did the car go to “car heaven”? Nope, it simple ceased to be, it vanished… it’s car-ness is no more… it existed from the point that it’s critical parts made it a car and was a car while it was a car and then it ceased to be after it was disassembled at that critical moment when enough parts where removed that it ceased to be…
Enjoy being alive. It is all that matters. Everything else is meaningless.
There is no mystery about death. Only people who don’t want to face it or those that don’t like it make it mysterious and invent alleged gods and being saved by jesus to a futile pitiful attempt to defy the objective reality of Nature in it’s harshness and cold fact of obliterating end of life.
Science wins over mythology. If after reading the attached article/document you still believe in the resurrection of jesus you know that you’re highly delusional and denying the facts of life in the objective reality of Nature.
BE. Even BE kind to others. For no other reason than the shocking horror of our own ceasing to be.
Here is the science:
Beyond the Grave – Understanding Human Decomposition
by Arpad A. Vass, Senior Staff Scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Tennessee in Forensic Anthropology.
Reprinted from MICROBIOLOGY TODAY, page 190, VOL 28/NOV 2001.
This verbatim copy below ( PDF version Beyond the Grave – understanding human decomposition – no photos v1) of the text has been sanitized of the horrific graphic photos.
Warning: original version with highly graphic photos of actual bodies decomposing. PDF: Not suitable for most people.
Human decomposition begins approximately 4 minutes after death has occurred. The onset is governed by a process called autolysis – or self-digestion. As cells of the body are deprived of oxygen, carbon dioxide in the blood increases, pH decreases and wastes accumulate which poison the cells. Concomitantly, unchecked cellular enzymes (lipases, proteases, amylases, etc.) begin to dissolve the cells from the inside out, eventually causing them to rupture, and releasing nutrient-rich fluids. This process begins and progresses more rapidly in tissues that have a high enzyme content (such as the liver) and a high water content such as the brain, but eventually affects all the cells in the body. Autolysis usually does not become visually apparent for a few days. It is first observed by the appearance of fluidfilled blisters on the skin and skin slippage where large sheets of skin slough off the body. Meanwhile, the body has acclimated to ambient temperature (algor mortis), blood has settled in the body causing discoloration of the skin (livor mortis) and cellular cytoplasm has gelled due to increased acidity (rigor mortis). After enough cells have ruptured, nutrient-rich fluids become available and the process of putrefaction can begin. Read the rest of this entry »
“Scientists from around the world are providing even more evidence of global warming. ‘A comprehensive review of key climate indicators confirms the world is warming and the past decade was the warmest on record,’ the annual State of the Climate report declares. Compiled by more than 300 scientists from 48 countries, including Canada, the report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said its analysis of 10 indicators that are ‘clearly and directly related to surface temperatures, all tell the same story: Global warming is undeniable.’” – Slashdot.org article “Global Warming ‘Undeniable,’ Report Says”
Yikes, start packing for doomsday for the soothsayers are out and about using The Force to intensify propaganda after their self inflicted Climate Gate revelations of their Alarmist Scientist Core Cult members improprieties. Pack light though, it’s going to be a scorcher, allegedly. Hawaii at the North Pole. I really am beginning to wonder if all these alarmist scientists are just rapture christians firing things up for the coming end times? Nostradamus still beats any climate scientist with soothsaying doomsday predictions. Hands down, and he’s been dead a long time. Now how can that be? Let’s explore the science that prevents predictions of complex systems. Read the rest of this entry »
The real climate “deniers” are the ones denying access to the data.
The real climate “deniers” are those that say the science is settled when it’s notl
The real climate “deniers” are those that deny the problems with the wild claims alleged.
The real climate deniers are those that allege the AGW hypothesis based upon flawed statistical pseudo-science.
The real climate deniers are those that deny that at the heart of the scientific method is criticism that can falsify the alleged hypotheses put forward by supporters of a hypothesis. Read the rest of this entry »
CARGO CULT SCIENCE by Richard Feynman
Adapted from the Caltech commencement address given in 1974.
During the Middle Ages there were all kinds of crazy ideas, such as that a piece of rhinoceros horn would increase potency. Then a method was discovered for separating the ideas–which was to try one to see if it worked, and if it didn’t work, to eliminate it. This method became organized, of course, into science. And it developed very well, so that we are now in the scientific age. It is such a scientific age, in fact that we have difficulty in understanding how witch doctors could ever have existed, when nothing that they proposed ever really worked–or very little of it did.
But even today I meet lots of people who sooner or later get me into a conversation about UFOS, or astrology, or some form of mysticism, expanded consciousness, new types of awareness, ESP, and so forth. And I’ve concluded that it’s not a scientific world.
You’ve got it wrong and backwards David Brin, it isn’t a war on science, it’s a war FOR hard verifiable and open science with integrity and the highest standards that the scientific method can bring to bear on climate science!
“The schism over global climate change (GCC) has become an intellectual chasm, across which everyone perceives the other side as Koolaid-drinkers. Although I have mixed views of my own about the science of GCC, and have closely grilled a number of colleagues who are front-line atmospheric scientists (some at JPL), I’m afraid all the anecdotes and politics-drenched “questions” flying about right now aren’t shedding light. They are, in fact, quite beside the point.
That is because science itself is the main issue: its relevance and utility as a decision-making tool.” – David Brin [1]
David Brin wasn’t discussing the science of climate change at all in the above article. Instead he’s making some false arguments. Yes, “science itself is the main issue” and cool-aid drinking by anybody should be saved for fun summer days at the beach. Unfortunately David Brin takes some huge gulps himself gorging on the political fumes put off by the alleged AGW hypothesis instead of dealing with ensuring that hard science is applied to climate science.
As is evident in the first few frames of this security camera you can see the building (reportedly a shopping mall type structure) collapse. That’s extremely fast considering that it basically went down on the first few earthquake wave crests in the first few seconds of this 7.0 quake. It really shows the potent power of The BIG ONE! Imagine what that would do in your city.
At seven seconds into the video the building is standing. The camera starts moving at second 8. Smoke from the collapsing building is visible during second 10 and clearly the building falls by second 11. That’s about three seconds from first wave to catastrophic destruction of the structure. That’s not even enough time to comprehend what is happening if you’re standing in the structure before the roof comes down on your head. Yikes.
Cars driving down the road clearly divert from their lanes. At second 25 a truck appears on the left side of the video and attempts to turn left onto the main road and arcs left losing control – having just missed a car by a second or two – and comes to a stop before hitting the collapsing building. Double yikes.
As you can see from this Google Earth Satellite image below annotated with earthquake symbols, most of which have happened between Jan 10th, 2010 and today, Jan 18th, there is a massive cluster of aftershocks to the west of the hard hit area of Port-Au-Prince. What is of note though is the numerous numbers of low magnitude quakes just to the north of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Some of these are actually under Puerto Rico. Too close for comfort.
(Click image to enlarge).
This is quite the number of aftershocks and also reveals the underlying fault lines.
Do these sets of aftershocks under and to the north of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands provide a warning of dangers lurking or has the pressures on the underlying plates been relieved somewhat so that danger has been reduced? I wonder.
Update 20100119: Additional earthquakes: “It’s one week after the Haiti Earthquake and the World has seen earthquakes in Argentina, Venezuela and most recently Guatemala.” – San Francisco Gate (1). How likely are these additional quakes related to the Haiti quake and aftershocks? Could these be adjustments resulting from the Haiti quake? Hmm….
Update 20100120: The quakes continue in the region with another large one hitting Haiti (5.9 with some reports saying 6.1) today.
CO2 CANNOT CAUSE ANY MORE “GLOBAL WARMING”
FERENC MISKOLCZI’S SATURATED GREENHOUSE EFFECT THEORY
by Miklos Zagoni, 2007 IPCC Reviewer, Physicist
Eotvos Lorand University, Budapest, Hungary
December 18, 2009
The Earth’s atmosphere differs in essence from that of Venus and Mars. Our atmosphere is not totally cloud-covered, as is Venus: globally, about 40% of the sky is always clear. Also we have huge ocean surfaces that serve as a practically unlimited reservoir of water vapor for the air.
With the help of these two conditions, the Earth’s atmosphere attains what the other two planets cannot: a constant, maximized, saturated greenhouse effect, so that adding more greenhouse gases to the mix will not increase the magnitude of the greenhouse effect and, therefore, will not cause any further “global warming”.
The surface temperature of Venus is hot, because the total cloud cover prevents heat from escaping to outer space. Mars’ surface is cold, because there is not enough greenhouse gas to reach the energy-saturation limit. Only the Earth has these two important features that have allowed it to maximize its greenhouse effect, completely using all available energy from the Sun.
This assertion is not a result of desk speculations. Nor is it a special hypothesis based on assumptions of limited application. It is the outcome of detailed spectral radiative-transfer analysis of huge archives of atmospheric data from NASA and elsewhere.
The project started about 25 years ago, when Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi, a Hungarian physicist, began to write a high-resolution atmospheric radiative transfer code — a special computer program that is necessary if we want to calculate the atmosphere’s infrared radiative processes precisely.
Understanding the downwelling and upwelling long-wave fluxes in the atmosphere is essential if we are to compute the Earth’s global energy balance and its greenhouse effect accurately.
“The natural state of the world for the last few million years is ice ages with intermittent warm periods lasting you know typically 10,000 years which we’re in now, year 10,000 now so logically there is an ice age due.” – Piers Corbyn
Regarding Piers Corbyn’s recent forecasts.
This graphic from NSIDC on the right side shows the “negative phase of the artic oscillation” weather pattern that seems to be happening now as Piers Corbyn forecast with the cold blowing (see the two black arrows labeled “cold” in the right side of the diagram) over northern Europe and Canada and the USA.
It sure looks like Piers Corbyn called it right using a forecasting model based upon the Arctic Oscillation Index and comprehension of the diagram you show above. Cold blowing across Europe and Canada/USA in the NO graphic as Piers forecast. Fascinating.
If Mount Mayon pops it could put a huge amount of material into the atmosphere.
Maybe the Mayan’s had it right after all with 2012 but actually meant “Mayon” not “Mayan”? Ok, not. Sorry, couldn’t resist. Actually the way the locals pronounce “Mayon” sounds like “Mayan”, almost.
Run for the hills! Er, run away from the hill! Er, run away from the mountain!
Anyhow this could be a big event. Certainly lots of video of it now. Don’t know how much video will make it out if it pops big.
Mayon Volcano, also known as Mount Mayon, is an active stratovolcano in the province of Albay, in the Bicol Region, on the island of Luzon, in the Philippines. Renowned as the “perfect cone” because of its almost perfect conical shape, Mayon is situated 15 kilometres northwest of Legazpi City.
In the following graph the BLUE line is RAW temperature data while the line RED is HUMAN ADJUSTED homogenized/mixed data” of Darwin Airport in Australia.
You can see the RED line take an upward swing showing “warming” while the blue line shows a slight cooling trend overall.
The RED ADJUSTED data shows HUMAN BIAS introduced by the calculations of the alleged climate scientists. Human bias creates “man made global warming”! The black line shows their ever increasing biased adjustments to get their data inline with their political agenda (possibly done subconsciously or possibly consciously – not sure which is actually worse, fraud or incompetence).
Yes, global warming climate change is man made in the sense that human bias creates global warming climate change and not the life giving essential plant nutrient CO2 as this graph clearly shows! CO2 is cleared of guilt as are humans (except for those biased alleged climate scientists and activists who are guilty of inciting mass panic yelling fire)! Amazing! Read the rest of this entry »
Let’s look at some of the reasons why climate change is natural. Original bullet points are from Jim McConalogue of the European Foundation, highlighting, links and commentary below the line in each point are by pwl. I’ll be updating this page to flush out the commentary for most of the items as the days go on. Whenever possible I will quote actual scientists who have expertise on a particular point or set of points, and even better I will post a video of them discussing the issues directly. If you have any additional points, counter points, corrections, better links, or additional links you’d like to have added please make a comment.
In compiling this assessment, I am grateful to the real hard-working academic researchers and professors; the integrity and arguments of Roger Helmer MEP; the ‘Friends of Science’ organisation for providing facts and myths on climate change; the United States organisation, ‘No Cap-and-Trade Coalition’; for the detailed research by Dr. Singer in his editing of the report, ‘Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate’, (The Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change), published by The Heartland Institute in 2008 and also his report with Dr. Idso, ‘Climate Change Reconsidered: The 2009 Report of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC)’, also published by the Heartland Institute in 2009, where many of the central arguments are drawn from. Also, the work and insights by Lord Monckton of Brenchley’s report ‘Climategate: Caught Green-handed! Cold facts about the hot topic of global temperature change after the Climategate Scandal’, Science & Public Policy Institute, 2009 have been useful. I have attempted to credit all other researchers and organisations in the content of the report. Other valuable papers include Dr. Nils-Axel Mörner in Executive Intelligence Review, 22 June 2007 and John McLean’s paper ‘The IPCC can’t count its “expert scientists”: Author and reviewer numbers are wrong’ in January 2009, all of which I have used to compile my pamphlet.” – Jim McConalogue
01) There is “no real scientific proof” that the current warming is caused by the rise of greenhouse gases from man’s activity.
“Evidence is information, such as facts, coupled with principles of inference (the act or process of deriving a conclusion), that make information relevant to the support or disproof of a hypothesis. Scientific evidence is evidence where the dependence of the evidence on principles of inference is not conceded, enabling others to examine the background beliefs or assumptions employed to determine if facts are relevant to the support of or falsification of a hypothesis.
“A person’s assumptions or beliefs about the relationship between alleged facts and a hypothesis will determine if that person takes the facts as evidence. … A person’s assumptions or beliefs about the relationship between alleged facts and a hypothesis will also determine how a person utilizes the facts as evidence. … In summary, beliefs or assumptions about causal relationships are utilized to determine whether facts are evidence of a hypothesis.
Background beliefs differ. As a result, where observers operate under different paradigms, rational observers may find different meaning in scientific evidence from the same event. … Note that a causal relationship between the facts and hypothesis does not exist to cause the facts to be taken as evidence[1], but rather the causal relationship is provided by the person seeking to establish facts as evidence.
Popper provides that a scientist creatively develops a theory which may be falsified by testing the theory against evidence or known facts. Popper’s theory presents an asymmetry in that evidence can prove a theory wrong, by establishing facts that are inconsistent with the theory. In contrast, evidence cannot prove a theory correct because other evidence, yet to be discovered, may exist that is inconsistent with the theory.”
Many of these 100 Reasons provide alternative interpretations of the data or counter evidence that falsify the man made global warming climate change hypothesis.
02) Man-made carbon dioxide emissions throughout human history constitute less than 0.00022 percent of the total naturally emitted from the mantle of the earth during geological history.
03) Warmer periods of the Earth’s history came around 800 years before rises in CO2 levels.
04) After World War II, there was a huge surge in recorded CO2 emissions but global temperatures fell for four decades after 1940.
05) Throughout the Earth’s history, temperatures have often been warmer than now and CO2 levels have often been higher – more than ten times as high.
06) Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout geologic time.
07) The 0.7C increase in the average global temperature over the last hundred years is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term, natural climate trends.
08) The IPCC theory is driven by just 60 scientists and favourable reviewers not the 4,000 usually cited.
“The belief that the ends justifies the means may be the true root of all evil.” – Troy Brumley
“Al Gore, First Emperor of the Moon, Head Authority on Mann-Made Climate Change“
“In the United States of America, unfortunately we [alarmists] still live in a bubble of unreality [see photo above]. And the Category 5 denial is an enormous obstacle to any discussion of solutions. Nobody is interested in solutions if they don’t think there’s a problem. Given that starting point, I believe it is appropriate [for the ends to justify the means and thus] to have an over-representation of factual presentations [aka exaggerate aka lie aka ignore counter evidence aka commit fraud] on how dangerous (global warming) is, as a predicate for opening up the audience to listen to what the solutions are, and how hopeful it is that we are going to solve this crisis.” — Al Gore in an interview. “
“So there is no need to invoke a complicated explanation for global warming involving disputed data on sunspots, cosmic rays and clouds, as some sceptics continue to do. The answer lies not in elaborate suppositions, but in the science and the data we can trust.” – Sun sets on sceptics’ case against climate change, Steve Connor,
The question is what is the science? How do you separate the wheat from the chaff? What happens when the data can’t be trusted due to the games that the alleged scientists involved played with it?
The climate debate seems to be less and less about the science than it does to be about people’s internal mental representation of their “beliefs” about the science that they “trust”.
Christopher Monckton proves to be an amazing interviewer.
“I’m most grateful to you for having giving me so much of your time. I do beg you not to believe either me or anyone else on this but do exactly what you just said and check for yourself and when you do I think you’ll find you’re addressing a non-problem. Thank you very much.” – Christopher Monckton
In the ideals of science “belief” and “trust” have no place as anyone would be able to “replicate” the science claims of any hypothesis on their own at any time.
For some hard sciences this is possible, for example with Newton’s gravity hypothesis just about anyone can do the experiments to confirm or refute the claims. Of course to test Einstein’s claims takes a bit more work and a lot more understanding as to grasp Relativity takes deeper comprehension.
What I wonder about is how can someone grasp what is going on in the global warming climate change debates without bring trust and belief into it? Is it even possible?
Many people I talk to find it difficult to accept that the raw temperature data from the scientists that collect it could be untrustworthy due to sloppy science or due to deliberate manipulation. They think that one couldn’t get away with it. Again it comes down to trust.
# have confidence or faith in; “We can trust in God”; “Rely on your friends”; “bank on your good education”; “I swear by my grandmother’s recipes”
# something (as property) held by one party (the trustee) for the benefit of another (the beneficiary); “he is the beneficiary of a generous trust …
# allow without fear
# reliance: certainty based on past experience; “he wrote the paper with considerable reliance on the work of other scientists”; “he put more trust in his own two legs than in the gun”
# believe: be confident about something; “I believe that he will come back from the war”
# the trait of believing in the honesty and reliability of others; “the experience destroyed his trust and personal dignity”
# hope: expect and wish; “I trust you will behave better from now on”; “I hope she understands that she cannot expect a raise”
# a consortium of independent organizations formed to limit competition by controlling the production and distribution of a product or service; “they set up the trust in the hope of gaining a monopoly”
# entrust: confer a trust upon; “The messenger was entrusted with the general’s secret”; “I commit my soul to God”
# faith: complete confidence in a person or plan etc; “he cherished the faith of a good woman”; “the doctor-patient relationship is based on trust”
# extend credit to; “don’t trust my ex-wife; I won’t pay her debts anymore”
# confidence: a trustful relationship; “he took me into his confidence”; “he betrayed their trust”
It seems that “trust” is replete with “belief and confidence being placed in” others. Here in lies the problem with such a complex discussion about climate science. It is complex and most people tune out when the math gets mentioned. As a result of eyes glazing over they revert to the basic human feeling of trusting another, often trusting the “experts with authority”. I suspect that in the global warming climate debates most people suffer from the belief stricken false argument of appealing to authority since they can’t deal with or won’t deal with the science involved.
Part of the reason is that people often want to simplify by distilling the options down to a simple decision. They don’t want to have to evaluate the thousands of details involved as it takes a considerable amount of time to comprehend each new detail.
I started this blog after a year or so following the debate. What happened was enlightening to me that the facade of “the truth as known by the consensus popular view of science” on many topics was shattered when I asked a couple of questions. It turned out that I simply wanted to comprehend the basic science behind the claims of man made global warming climate change. As someone dedicated to life long learning and a deep interest in science, I work as a systems scientist and with complex software and hardware systems, I thought it would be good to learn the basics by asking a few questions. So I was at a science blog and posted a couple of questions about an article that I’d seen come up in a Google search. The article was from a weather man in South America commenting on Darwin’s notes during his long voyage, the comments were about the climate. The article was suggesting that the climate hasn’t really changed all that much since then. Well not knowing the “veracity” of such claims I thought I’d ask a few questions of people who seemed to be knowledgeable about science and climate science.
The response was shocking indeed. Very quickly I was vilified for asking questions that hit at the assumption of man made global warming climate change. As I pointed out that they weren’t answering the questions but were simply engaging in ad hominem personal attacks and being unscientific in doing so it escalated to the point where I wasn’t just booted off their forums but was banned and all my comments were deleted in the process. Censorship was at work, and alive and well. At some point I might post the copies of the portions of the conversations from those postings that I had the fortitude to save. In any event the specific details aren’t the main point I’m making with this story of what happened.
What occurs to me is that each person makes a mental representation, a map if you will, of what they think is objective reality. Portions of this map are highly accurate. Other portions of the map aren’t so accurate. The key thing that people forget is that “The Map Isn’t the Territory.”
“Two important characteristics of maps should be noticed. A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness.” – Alfred Korzybski
This applies in science as scientists need – as a result of human biology and in particular as a result of human brain biology – to make a mental map of objective reality. By necessity this map will have its accurate portions and its inaccurate portions and parts everywhere in between. A main challenge in science, other than the complexities of technology and technical or theoretical knowledge, is ensuring that one’s map is accurate in as many places that matter and importantly in as many places as is necessary to support one’s science. The challenge rests is determining what is real in objective reality and what is just (as in only perceived to be) real in one’s map of objective reality. If it’s only real in ones map of objective reality and not actually real in objective reality then what we are dealing with is a belief and not objective reality.
In science the resolution of belief verses what is really real is supposed to be what can be proven to be real via tools such as the scientific method which uses experiment and observations to confirm or refute science claims from our maps of reality. Of course even when our maps of objective reality are confirmed to the Nth digit of precision they are still maps, although possibly highly accurate maps, and not objective reality itself.
Nature, the mother not the journal, is the final judge in all matters of science – not human judgments, not peer review consensus, not peer review refutations, not our opinions. Nature is the final judge, jury and executioner of all scientific knowledge and for what is real in objective reality. We only need adjust our maps to be as accurate as possible with Nature. This is of course harder said than done. Climate science is one such place where that is particularly difficult due to the high complexity of the many Natural Systems involved.
The deep challenge comes in when there are many differing views on what is being observed, theorized and concluded by human scientists. As humans scientists are also fallible. The scientific method and process is supposed to mitigate against this human bias towards our favorite maps of objective reality.
As the Climategate emails, documents and programs have confirmed the so called consensus and peer review process and even the very heart of the climate science itself has been deeply compromised. Humans it seems, yes even the previously trusted and venerated Climategate alleged scientists have fallen into the ancient patterns of our ancestors – belief stricken group think, thought control or thought management tactics, and politics.
One of the possible outcomes of the Climategate affair is that scientists involved in climate science might start speaking out about how their science research refutes the mainstream group think consensus views.
Any scientific hypothesis is supposed to rise or fail based upon the evidence. It’s coming on a year since I started this blog, Paths To Knowledge dot net, and I’ve yet to even begin to scratch the surface of comprehending the many thousands of issues and detailed points in climate science. No wonder the typical person gives up and takes up “trust in authorities”, as it’s a massive challenge just learning the issues let alone the much more difficult challenge in being able to evaluate these issues and make a determination that has anything to actually do with objective reality. Sure it’s easy to make choices and build up a map of the world that one thinks is reality, it’s quite another to be able to build up a map that can withstand the hard objective tests of the scientific method.
The more that I learn about the science of climate science the less and less the promoted map of man made global warming climate change makes any sense.
Some say there is a mountain of evidence. That may well be, and if so please bring it to me for I can’t see the mountain from where I currently stand.
Nature is the final judge of all science. It is not in the minds of men but in Nature where we test the mettle of any scientific claims.
In my journey to find out for myself what the actual science says and what the criticisms of that science say I’m not only learning about the climate science and other sciences but I’m learning a lot about human nature and the nature of “belief” and “trust” and “faith” and how these can be seriously dark forces when the masses of humanity take up a mental map of reality that doesn’t correspond to the objective reality of Nature itself.
One thing that constantly amazes me when talking to people about the climate is that most people cut off the discussion when it gets too detailed or when a point challenges a “belief” they have about it. For example, many people state that they north polar cap is melting and that that is serious evidence of man made global warming climate change. Ok, I say, what about the observed fact that the amount of ice on Earth is about constant with the southern hemisphere growing in ice about as much as the northern hemisphere loses ice? At this point many people loose their grasp on the conversation when they invoke appeals to authority. This is part of the challenge of science education but even deeper is the problem of how do you teach or educate people about a science that is in flux or that has so much controversy particularly when it’s denied that there is any controversy within the community of authorities on climate science?
How do people of reason comprehend the complexities of climate science let alone determine what is real and what is belief stricken dogma or bad science?
The interesting thing about belief stricken maps of objective reality is that they die with you while the objective reality of Nature keeps on going regardless of us or how we view it.
A real profound question is how are we being in the face of a global pandemic of belief stricken humans who have maps of objective reality that are so far from Nature that it has a serious impact upon society? How does one effectively communicate empowering people to actually grasp and most importantly test the notions of climate science themselves? Is it even possible? Will there always need to be trust and belief involved? How many does it take to shift the paradigm?
The climategate documents demonstrate that one or a few people dedicated to finding out the scientific truths can make a significant difference to the conversation as well as to the actual science involved. As the political shock waves of Climategate reverberate across the world and in the minds of key decision makers what are the next steps?
As I end this first year studying climate science and posting over 400 articles do I have any definitive answers on man made global warming climate science? No, what I’ve seen deeply and profoundly has shaken my own mental maps in the confidence of “science” especially that of what one reads in the popular media and online but even more so of “peer reviewed” articles. I’m much more skeptical of scientific claims in the sense that I’m continuing to ask basic questions of any science that I come across. The spirit of science is to ask questions and is to question all the basic assumptions. The spirit of science education is to allow those questions and to engage with those asking to spread scientific knowledge but also to vet the science. Anything less isn’t science but is something best left to our ancestors in the dark caves of history.
The enlightenment faces its greatest challenge, the power of belief, faith, trust and confidence to distort the best mental maps we have of objective reality into political propaganda tools.
What ever you do find out the science for yourself from a direct as possible a source. Never believe what science writers or science journalists say as their opinions are very often biased due to their own belief stricken conclusions already made. Be INDEPENDENT! Find out for yourself.
The other probably better caution is to not make a decision on man made global warming climate change unless you’ve done extensive research from direct sources and have learned the science and counter science. This point of view is based upon the reality that climate change is a very complex field of science and it’s not easily reducible to platitudes or simplistic beliefs. There are also many social and economic policies now being intertwined with the science mixing up the clarity with their political propaganda messages. Use extreme caution with anyone who says the science is settled or that consensus is science for as we know from basic science philosophy these are never the case as science is always the pursuit of the nature of objective reality.
Very cool tool from visualizing data from NASA satellites in 3d in a web browser.
What I’m interested in is not just the visualization aspect but the actual data behind the visualizations since as we know from the Climategate confirmations of scientific fraud in climate science visual images can be highly misleading towards the alleged scientists point of view. Raw data please. All manipulations MUST be FULLY documented with the software source code that made the changes and detailed reasons listed for all adjustments.
If we are to raise our knowledge, skills and competence in using the scientific method to study the Earth, Moon, Sol and other relevant systems we must do some basic learning. Hard science requires making use of hard data without cheating and with showing ones data and any adjustments with justifications and open source code for auditing and proper open peer reviews!
Now let’s see what we can learn from this 3d puppy. My favorite is the GRACE Gravity satellites.
I’ve often wondered what impact the uneven gravity has on the Earth’s climate systems and if the gravity effects are taken into account in the so called climate models. As you can see from the above video the Earth isn’t even an oblate spheroid, it’s a really bumpy place when it comes to gravity. This must impact the weather and thus the climate systems as the atmosphere and water and ice move about.
John Coleman, the founder of The Weather Channel speaks out against global warming.
“John Coleman is a harsh critic of anthropogenic global warming. In the fall of 2007, he described the current concern over global warming “a fictional, manufactured crisis, and a total scam.”. In 2008, Coleman gave a speech of the same tone, before the San Diego Chamber of Commerce, blaming the “global warming scam” and environmentalist lobby, for rising gas and food prices. He also declared the scam “a threat to our economy and our civilization.”
Yeah, the planet is either cooling, staying the same or warming. Dah.
What amazes me is that they think they can find the causes in such a complex system and assign with any accuracy the percentage warming from each of their selected causes of warming or cooling or staying the same.
December 7th, 2009, a day that will go down in infamy! Not allowed to exhale anymore. You can inhale but no exhaling anymore. No running. No exercise. No mice that roar! Nope, can’t have CO2. Grrr… Arrrgg…
Scientific hypotheses are supposed to fall when they fail to make predictions and another hypothesis comes along that can predict better.
The AGW Hypothesis has failed to predict the cooling trend and now they are looking to explain it after their hypothesis was falsified by Mother Nature.
The Solar Weather Technique gets better results! Sometimes as accurate as 85% a year or so into the future! Now that’s impressive. What’s even more impressive is that he tracks his successes and failures to learn from them! Wait? A scientist learning from his failures? Seriously wow, epic!
As it stands the Solar Weather Technique is doing better than AGW!
The fact that the AGW Hypothesis Alarmist crowd keeps having varying explanations indicates that they hypothesis has once again failed as it shows little if any predictive powers beyond soothsaying with dead tree entrails!
It’s “manN made ” since Michael Mann, one of the primary Climategate alleged scientists, invented the hockey stick graph used in Al Gore’s science fiction film used to cry wolf and fire in crowded theaters everywhere. When we say he “invented” the graph that is saying he “made it up” as in faked the data with his fellow alleged climate scientists, Phil Jones, et. al.. They cooked the data books! They falsified the data which also happens to falsifies their hypothesis as well.
“Bad explanations are easy to vary while good explanations are hard to vary.” – David Deutsch
The key issue with an theory whether it’s a myth or a scientific theory is that not only must it have testable predictions but more importantly it’s “explanation” of objective reality must be hard to vary; in other words, there can’t be many or any variations of the explanation. The narrower the explanation that has success making predictions the closer that hypothesis (theory) is to objective reality. The more variants to the hypothesis (theory) that have as accurate (or inaccurate as the case may be) predictive power the less likely those hypotheses (or theories) have to do with objective reality.
For example, Newton’s Gravitation Theory is very accurate and has tremendous success with predictions however it was long known that it failed in some cases. Einstein came along and filled in that gap with a more accurate theory, General and Special Relativity.
Slice and dice, Occam’s Razor now has a corollary in “bad explanations are easy to vary while good explanations are hard to vary”.
One of the four strands of reality inThe Fabric of Realityis the strand of “Karl Popper’s epistemology, especially its anti-inductivism and its requiring a realist (non-instrumental) interpretation of scientific theories, and its emphasis on taking seriously those bold conjectures that resist falsification.“
We have seen Noam Chomsky’s principle of “Manufacturing Consent” working with the Climategate criminals Jones, Mann, et. al.. A conspiracy of “values and beliefs”, an elitist clique that thought that they were above the rest of the people they worked for, us. Other scientists have this “academic” elitist bias or shared value, that says that you need not just the “qualifications” but the “right attitude” otherwise you’re “outside the group”. Einstein broke the mold as have McIntyre and others, Einstein was a “patent clerk” when he worked on his famous breakthroughs.
Now we see it with Jon Stewart. While making light of the Climategate in a really funny way he reveals his bias in that he “believes” in “global warming” when he says “does it [Climategate] disprove global warming, no”. Unfortunately it’s much more complex than Jon Stewart realizes and that his shared values and beliefs in “global warming” blind him from deeper inquiry. OR, as a masterful media perception shaper he’s doing his job of making people laugh with short segments and the Climategate is way too much to get into and his demographic also shares his values in “global warming”.
In any event the science will clearly demonstrate what’s going on as time unfolds and Nature does what she does.
What’s interesting in Jon Stewart’s masterful media play is really how good he is at it.
Following on the Watts Up With That article on Google Trends I was curious. Naturally.
Spending a few minutes with Google Trends I typed in “Monckton” and the graph of searches goes up with time while the new reports go down with time. They, the mainstream news, seems to be avoiding Christopher Monckton like the plague.
As this Google Trend (link at bottom) shows this trend graph is troubling for a number of possible reasons.
For starters it is obvious that Christopher Monckton is having an impact through Al Gore’s Intertubes and alternative sources.
It’s also clear that Monckton is being avoided by the mainstream press, at least those that are included in the Google Trends.
Could it be the “manufacturing of consent” that Noam Chomsky talks about at length where it is “shared values and beliefs” that creates the “conspiracy” to subvert certain ideas, thoughts, and people or groups, and not an explicit phone call such as Al Gore calling up his fellow board members at Google and other friends at news companies and saying “down with Monckton” in the news?
Alas it’s not a question that is likely to be answered, although we did think that before the revelations of the Climategate emails, data and programs were released which confirmed the long suspected criminal behavior of Jones, Mann, et. al. and of the fraudulent activities of AGW promoters such as Al Gore.
I do wonder though what it will take for Christopher Monckton to breakout into the mainstream news media. Maybe his attendance at the up coming Copenhagen Climate Conference (of global domination) will enable him access to the mainstream press in ways that they can’t ignore? We’ll see. It certainly will enable one to see the “shared values” of the mainstream news media in a new light.
We have seen Noam Chomsky’s principle of “Manufacturing Consent” working with the Climategate criminals Jones, Mann, et. al.. A conspiracy of “values and beliefs”, an elitist clique that thought that they were above the rest of the people they worked for, us. Other scientists have this “academic” elitist bias or shared value, that says that you need not just the “qualifications” but the “right attitude” otherwise you’re “outside the group”. Einstein broke the mold as have McIntyre and others, Einstein was a “patent clerk” when he worked on his famous breakthroughs.
But wait there more of interest at the Google Trends.
I started Paths To Knowledge dot NET because I asked what seemed to me to be basic questions of the Man Made Global Warming Climate Change and instead of educating me with informative answers all I got was (1) to be vilified with personal attacks for asking the questions, and (2) told there was a mountain of research proving it.
Well, the first set of personal attack responses to basic questions to prove AGW showed me that the people weren’t being scientific but that they were “belief stricken” with beliefs that AGW was true and how dare anyone ask any questions that might question that belief. Sounded like they got AGW religion to me.
As for the mountain of evidence, people are still telling me there is a mountain of evidence but when I ask those that say that for that evidence they don’t have any. So if you have a mountain of evidence please point to it.
The purpose of asking questions is to find out.
The Climategate whistle blower sure pointed out some serious problems with the alleged mountain of evidence.
Three men assaulted by goons under orders from Al Gore.
Does Al Gore still think he has sovereign powers as an ex-president? Where does Al Gore get off illegally forcibly assaulting people who ask him questions he doesn’t like? I know of nothing in the US Constitution that would permit a private citizen to use force as was done here multiple times.
The evidence shows that Al Gore considers questions on Climategate and AGW from non-violent people to be an imminent security threat as he orders his (secret service?) security detail to forcibly remove three people who ask inconvenient questions Mr Gore doesn’t like.
“CHICAGO IL – On Tuesday, November 24th 2009, We Are Change Chicago attended a book signing with former vice president Al Gore, at the Borders Bookstore on 150 N. State Street.
…
First up was Saad Ali. As he approached Gore, he peacefully and respectably asked, “Sir, can you comment on the emails and documents that were hacked [ClimateGate] that reveal… that the research was a fraud and that it was all manipulated?” Gore, with an evil smirk, claimed that “he never read them.” By the look on his face and his stutter, it became quite clear that Gore was extremely uncomfortable with the question, so he quickly glared towards his security. The agents grabbed and assaulted Saad, escorting him away from Gore for merely asking a simple question. The press took notice and started filming and snapping pictures of what was going on. One of which appeared the next day in the Chicago Sun Times.”
This of course isn’t the first time that Al Gore has used intimidation and assault to stifle free debate and free speech of his critics as these following videos testify to.
What is the difference between a soothsayer and an accurate prediction and forecasting foretelling the future weather and climate? Methodology and accuracy of results. First let’s define the terms.
A predictionis a statement or claim that a particular event will occur in the future in more certain terms than a forecast. The etymology of the word is Latin (præ-, “before,” and dicere, “to say“). Howard H. Stevenson writes: “Prediction is at least two things: Important and hard.” Important, because we have to act, and hard because we have to realize the future we want, and what is the best way to get there.
In a scientific context, a prediction is a rigorous, (often quantitative), statement forecasting what will happen under specific conditions, typically expressed in the form If A is true, then B will also be true. The scientific method is built on testing assertions which are logical consequences of scientific theories. This is done through repeatable experiments or observational studies.
A scientific theory whose assertions are not in accordance with observations and evidence will probably be rejected. Theories that make no testable predictions remain protosciences until testable predictions become known to the community.
Additionally, if new theories generate many new predictions, they are often highly valued, for they can be quickly and easily confirmed or falsified (see predictive power). In many scientific fields, desirable theories are those which predict a large number of events from relatively few underlying principles.
A soothsayeris a person who claims to speak sooth (truth or reality, smooth (political savy, gift of the gaff, able to smoothly con), or soft (the soft sell)): specifically one who predicts the future based upon personal, political, spiritual, mental, or religious beliefs rather than scientific facts.
Making up scientific facts or playing “tricks” with them to fit your theory disqualifies one from being a scientist as one is “soothsaying” and very likely committing fraud especially when claims are made that people act upon or when money is involved.
As we are learning from Climategate, clearly the AGW alarmist crowd would rather fudge the data than let the chips fall where they may. Phil Jones, Michael Mann et. al. have a lot to learn from those who accurately predict the weather and climate!
“What is their [Phil Jones Climate Research Unit's] success rate [at predicting the climate using their hypothesis of Anthropogenic Global Warming Climate Change (AGW)]?” – Corbyn
Let’s see. Here below is their infamous hockey stick graph and as the graph below it shows the actual data their success rate is, oh dear worse than zero since they faked the data… as proven with the Climategate revelations.
It seems clear that the CRU forecasts of extreme climate warming of ten years ago have been falsified (i.e. they failed) due to the FACT that the last decade has seen a decline in temperatures. When predicting weather or climate it’s not just your “hypothesis” that is important it’s the actual predictions that you make that succeed or fail to predict the future. You’ve got it wrong Phil Jones, Michael Mann et. al. as anyone can see by looking at the temperatures, and you admit it privately in the Climategate emails, have the guts to be men and publicly admit that your AGW predictions have failed!
The purple line is the rising CO2 levels and as you can see from the blue temperature graph the last decade has declined and not followed the rise in CO2. Funny that. Oh wait, that's direct evidence that the AGW hypothesis failed to predict the last decade and thus falsifies the hypothesis. Oops, darn Nature not cooperating with the hypothesis.
Well it’s the evidence shows it’s conclusive, Phil Jones, Michael Mann et. al. are soothsayers as their Hockey Stick AGW forecasts failed to predict accurately the last ten years.
It’s conclusive Piers Corbyn is on to something significant using the Solar Weather Technique to with high accuracy predict the future weather and climate. Not a soothsayer but a true scientist working his craft.
Let’s explore the Solar Weather Technique of Weather and Climate Forecasting that seems to achieve remarkable results.
“A verification of UK gale forecasts by the ‘solar weather technique’: October 1995–September 1997
In recent years the ‘solar weather’ technique of weather forecasting which takes into account of the influence of the sun has received much attention. No attempt has hitherto been made to determine the success, or otherwise, of elements of these forecasts, which include solar predictors and are prepared 6–11 months in advance of the events they predict. This paper conducts an evaluation of these forecasts but confines attention to the prediction of gales. Skill levels are assessed over different seasons. The results, whilst differing greatly between the seasons, reveal a degree of success that cannot readily be accounted for by chance and suggest that this system of forecasting continues to be assessed over a longer time period to further investigate these findings.“
Further detailed successful results are found on the linked page above.
[Piers] Corbyn’s predictions are based on what is called “The Solar Weather Technique.”[8] The technique “combines statistical analysis of over a century of historical weather patterns with clues derived from solar observations.”[1] He considers past weather patterns and solar observations and sun-earth magnetic connectivity. Conventional meteorology claims that such influences cause minimal impact on the Earth’s atmosphere[9].
STS-129 (ISS assembly flight ULF3)[2] was the most recent Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS). Atlantis launched on 16 November 2009, at 14:28 Eastern: UTC -5[3][4] and landed at 9:44 a.m. EST on 27 November 2009 on runway 33 at the Kennedy Space Center’s Shuttle Landing Facility.
STS-129 focused on staging spare components outside the station. The 11-day flight included three spacewalks. The payload bay carried two large ExPRESS Logistics Carriers holding two spare gyroscopes, two nitrogen tank assemblies, two pump modules, an ammonia tank assembly, a spare latching end effector for the station’s robotic arm, a spare trailing umbilical system for the Mobile Transporter, and a high-pressure gas tank. STS-129 was the first flight of an ExPRESS Logistics Carrier. The completion of this mission leaves five space shuttle flights remaining until the end of the program.[5]
Two streams of videos. First the series with Christopher Monckton interviewed by Michael Coren in Toronto, Canada and then the second series with Professor Lindzen. We also link to the professors new paper showing the new results on heat escaping from the Earth being ~1/6 that the IPCC guessed it was.
Here’s what you won’t hear on the CBC!
~”As the Earth warms it radiates more heat into space. Why is that important? The entire case of the AGW Alarmists is based on one false assumption that is built into all models is that as the world warms then less outgoing radiation will escape into space. That is contrary to reason and elementary physics. The computer models are told this wrong assumption. The Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) Satellite measured that more radiation gets out into space when the Earth warms. We now know that more radiation escapes and if it escapes it’s not heating the Earth.” – Christopher Monckton (paraphrased).
Well obviously it “Beg(ley)s the Question” (sorry I couldn’t resist) about why Ed Begley hasn’t read or seen the part of Climategate that shows that the so called “peer review” was hijacked and stacked and thus can’t be trusted! Oops! Obviously Ed’s not up on the latest developments or is choosing to ignore the evidence of the Very Serious Climategate Peer Review Process Corruption that has taken place!
Begging the question (or petitio principii, “assuming the initial point”) is a logical fallacy in which the proposition to be proved is assumed implicitly or explicitly in the premise. Begging the question is related to circular argument, circulus in probando (Latin for “circle in proving”) or circular reasoning but they are considered absolutely different by Aristotle.[1] The first known definition in the West is by the Greek philosopher Aristotle around 350 BC, in his book Prior Analytics, where he classified it as a material fallacy.
Worse than “Begging the Question” Begley uses the “Appeal to Authority” argument for constructing his belief based view of reality. In the video Ed Begley goes on and on literally yelling to control the interviewer with intimidation spouting “peer review” repeatedly in so many ways thus making an appeal to authorities. Unfortunately it fails for him due to the fraudulent representations of the Climategate alleged scientists. Regardless appeals to authority are not substantive in science, what is substantive in science is the cold hard verifiable evidence that either proves or refutes a hypothesis!
For intelligent people who require actual factual evidence of a claim in question the appeal to authority holds no value. What hold value to evidence based people is the actual factual verifiable and repeatable evidence! Prove your hypothesis conclusively with review by anyone with the skills to peer review it! Basing one’s important decisions on appeals to authority in science is just asking for serious trouble and invites cult style belief systems of thought. Verifiable Open Evidence is the knife that separates the facts from the fiction in science.
Source A says that p.
Source A is authoritative.
Therefore, p is true.
This is a fallacy because the truth or falsity of the claim is not necessarily related to the personal qualities of the claimant, and because the premises can be true, and the conclusion false (an authoritative claim can turn out to be false). It is also known as argumentum ad verecundiam (Latin: argument to respect) or ipse dixit (Latin: he himself said it). [1]
The Journals must be quivering under the Climategate revelations of peer review corruption. I wonder how many will crumble as a result? Or will they get their footing back and survive? I wonder how peer review journals will adapt their policies to correct for this pernicious corruption of the scientific process?
“By Ed’s reasoning, excluding everyone who is “not a degreed climate scientist” that rather puts Dr. James Hansen out of the picture, and many others, including Al Gore.” – Anthony Watts
So yes, according to Ed Begley no one without a PhD in “climate science” can be trusted. Not even Al Gore!. Not even Ed Begley himself who is giving advice! Oh wait, if Ed Begley can’t be trusted then neither can his advice about people having a climate science PhD after their name! Oh the hypocrisy abounds as does the lack of understanding of the scientific process! Read the rest of this entry »
