138 Comments

NO scientist "believes in science". That’s the opposite of how science works. We accept current knowledge, but are skeptical that we know all that we need to know and look for ways to detect problems with our knowledge.

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One of the things I always tell people is this: Pull the scientific journal article that is cited by the press. Read the process/procedure the article references, as well as the inference the authors draw. Ask yourself "should I believe this?" Believe it or not, most procedures are accessible, and not that hard to understand. Equally, the distance between the usual (grandiose) conclusions and the procedures is also obvious -- especially in the social sciences. Now adjust your thinking. Research is real, and should be respected. Not all research is bad. But everyone has a brain, and you can use that to decide for yourself. And yes -- I've been a scientist my entire career. That's what I do. it is FAR more accessible than folks realize.

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Yep. "Use the Force! Read the source..."

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"Most people don't think for themselves. They find it too hard." (condensed version of a quote from one of Michael Crichton's books)

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Nah - most people do not have the cognitive acumen to process science.

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True, but most of those don't pretend to be scientists.

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But, they are still taken in by the many charlatans.

Most people think that believing is as valid as knowing.

Most people think that emotions are as valid as reason.

Most people are totally unaware of scientifically described reality and are guided by primitive superstitions, myths, and emotions.

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"People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true."

- Wizard's First Rule

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Richard was a wet blanket but the naked wizard guy is cool

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Correction: no good scientist "believes in science". There are plenty of terrible ones out there.

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See? People do not understand what you're saying because of the ambiguity of language.

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I know plenty of scientists. Several of them are the exact opposite of skeptical and are political creatures first and foremost.

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Too many people (like Gkam) claim the mantle of scientist who are not scientists.

Rigorous scientists are not political or believers - pseudoscientists are.

However, many people wear more than one hat. They can be rigorous scientists in the lab, but political ideologists outside the lab. Sadly, scientists are not immune from the human tendency to let their beliefs trump their science.

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Then they are cult members, not scientists.

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Says someone who took no science.

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did you read the article lol

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I know, right?

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Yeah, I was referring to Mister Glat.

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Be honest, you were talking about yourself. You are the laughingstock of every forum you post your nonsense on. I'm one of the few who will still even respond to you - only because (and I admit it is a weakness) I get a sense of Schadenfreude kicking you around.

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Says the cult member.

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Scientists have faith in the idea that the universe has "laws", that is, they rely on the universe responding in a consistent way. They have faith in reproducibility.

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Good point, though I would replace "faith" with "understand".

Indeed, science is in a reproducibility crisis (a real crisis), where information in substantial numbers of papers in some fields is not reproducible. See, for example:

https://phys.org/news/2013-09-science-crisis.html

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/11/psychologys-replication-crisis-real/576223/

https://www.nationalacademies.org/our-work/reproducibility-and-replicability-in-science

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Exactly right. And peer-review isn't actually helping. Indeed, the evidence that peer-review actually works is not very strong.

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I agree with your premise, a "what it should be"...But that is not "what is" happening when skeptics are called deniers, and consensus is the public measure heaped upon the world while personal destruction is heaped upon the skeptic. That is then "scientists" refusing to look beyond their own personal interests of funding, the true warping affect of science today. Ultimately everything requires a degree of faith. Faith in numbers, which have been altered or ignored, like the hockey stick ignoring the late 30's. Faith in theory which as a child, everyone accepted lightening as a result of static discharge until someone did the calculus. Look at dinosaur theory. Today, climate change. In the 70s is was to be dead oceans and an ice age by now. The zealots are the scientists today heaping condemnation on those sinners and infidels who do not agree with consensus while refusing to look, listen, or consider they are wrong. They virtually burn at the stake any who disagree with their pontiff being the politician.

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Thank you for this thoughtful analysis of what is really going on.

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Bona fide scientists recognize on the basis of overwhelming evidence that rigorous science is epistemically superior (has a far better predictability quotient) to any and all other epistemologies (philosophy, literature, art, politics).

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You're starting this piece with hypocrisy, using the term "climate change denialism"! This was deliberately coined to pretend that reasoned, evidence-based criticism of the main stream, often faith-based climate "science" was similar to Holocaust denial so that questioning scientific establishment agreed narrative became beyond ther pale.

The people who coined it literally said they were trying to conflate CAGW sceptics, including, you know, a Nobel laureate atmospheric physicist, with Holocaust deniers.

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He's trying to wake up and get others to wake up. I noticed that too, but I'm cutting him some slack. We need to start somewhere. (And I agree that there are disturbing similarities between COVID hysteria and climate hysteria. Yes, humans are causing change, but we're either going to have to adjust to those changes OR make some really difficult decisions that are going to affect even John Kerry and not just the proles.)

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I accept as 100% settled science the IPCC Report on Climate Change. That's why I know there is no "climate crisis."

What is in that report, and does it tell us we are doomed? The only scientific finding in the report is a stated belief that, "all other things remaining the same" (they never do), there is a relatively weak linear relationship between total atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature. If you then read through all of the scenarios provided, you see that the answer to whether we are doomed does not lie with climate science, but rather with whether and for how long we will continue to use fossil fuels.

That answer can only come from studying our innovation trends, which I did. For 70 years, the prices of solar panels and batteries (cost for a given performance over the lifetime of the item) have been on an almost perfect exponential decline, similar to many (most?) other technologies. Unlike mature technologies like the internal combustion engine, neither is yet approaching the theoretical limits of science, and so we can reasonably expect the trends to continue for at least another 20 years - which is far longer than the remaining 5 years before batteries plus solar will be capable of providing reliable power 24x7x365 WITHOUT fossil fuel backup and without subsidies in the most populous parts of the world. 6 years later, they will be half that cost - and utilities will be building solar and grid storage as fast as banks will lend and factories can build in order to get rid of their less profitable fossil fuel plants.

In short, by 2050 only a few hobbyists will still be using fossil fuels for energy, for the same reasons we stopped buying horses and typewriters. The earth will be about 1C cooler (exactly where it was at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution) due to the Grand Solar Minimum which started this year, and the "extra CO2" in our atmosphere will be getting re-sequestered for free thanks to the ONLY part of AGW science for which satellite observations have actually matched predictions - Global Greening.

So, if you BELIEVE THE SCIENCE there is no climate crisis.

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Struck by the phrase 'Unlike mature technologies like the internal combustion engine'. Riding my bike yesterday along the thoroughfares of greater Phoenix, I noticed that when older (20-30 year old) cars pass by, the smell and fumes are quite obvious - outside odors in the dry desert air are particularly noticeable. I thought to myself, how far we've come when an odorless Lexus, with twice the horsepower of that ancient Pontiac, with better speed, handling and 32 mpg vs the 12mpg (and a quart of oil every second fill up) of the former 'muscle' car....we've come very far on the internal combustion engine in the last couple of decades and I'd wager we'll see faster technological change in the next couple of decades as well.

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The report also wasn't written by scientists. Non scientists actually wrote the paper. And some scientist's opinions were totally disregarded, like Dr. Paul Reiter's. So he had his name removed from the list of contributing scientists (who submitted papers). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3l28pwyI5Ac His explanation of how mosquito-borne diseases are spread is excellent. People get so focused on climate change, they forget other ways that diseases can be spread. He's also not the only one that had his name removed from the list.

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We will indeed. ICE is now close to the limits of thermal efficiency per the Laws of Thermodynamics. Utility Scale solar panels are only at best 20% theoretical efficiency, in practice 15% efficiency - upcoming products like those of Novasolilx are already over 40% efficient and may reach as much as 80-90% efficiency once they work through the same process of improvement that PV solar has undergone for 30 years. Not only will this cut costs, but it will cut the amount of required land use by 75%. Batteries are even more interesting - their biggest current limitation is the number of times they can be charged and discharged. What is the cost per charge cycle when a battery lasts forever? Products like Ambri's liquid metal battery, with it's potential to theoretically last forever (or if it doesn't, the materials are infinitely and inexpensively recyclable), aim to find out.

Worried about places with no sun? Don't be. 8 years ago our Navy patented a process to make clean burning carbon neutral synthetic drop-in replacements for gasoline or jet fuel/diesel out of seawater and electricity to allow a carrier force to operate without resupply of fuel for years. The primary cost is the electricity, and using electricity from the carrier (which is more expensive than current grid prices) they could have done it then for $3-6 / gallon. In about 12-15 years, daytime solar (no storage) will be about 1/2 to 1/4 what prices are today, and the Navy has improved their process - so we will be able to create factories in places like Houston (with open desert for solar), create these clean fuels for less than the cost to pump and refine petroleum, and pipe them directly into our existing infrastructure. https://phys.org/news/2020-07-low-cost-catalyst-seawater-fuel-scale.html

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Wow, thanks. You are much better informed than I am. I find the most interesting people in these comment sections.

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The wind generators and solar are a blight on the land. I want them gone

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Reads like a fine-tuned "news" release straight from the communications department of a Fortune 500 company, or perhaps a think tank very interested in the "optics" of climate change. "The answer can only come from studying our innovation trends, which I did." So then it's settled. Please circulate this among the other thousands of climate scientists with their doomsday scenarios so they cease harassing us. "The answer can only come from studying our innovation trends...." Mind if I share that one with some of the boys down at the Elks Club?

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You've raised autism to an art form, madam. What is it you think the IPCC Report says, anyway - that we are all doomed, so go inside and wait to die?

You are a true satire of a human being. The IPCC report simply says how much it will warm based on how much extra CO2 humans put in the air - yet you treat it as a holy writ of the apocalypse. And no, madam, climate scientists don't get paid to study innovation trends - they get paid to study the relationship between CO2 levels and global temperatures, all other things remaining equal - which they NEVER do.

Yes, feel free to share with the Elks club - as you likely share all your charms with them for a fee. And, in the future please note that this is a forum for adults - so do not come back until you can act like one.

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Here's a nice little lesson for everyone out there on how to spot a propagandist at work. Observe how Galt falsely attributes to me his statement and idea that "the answer can only come from studying our innovation trends," by quoting me, in my post, saying that climate scientists "study innovation trends," where I said no such thing. I was heckling him for his churlishly weak assertion that "innovation trends" offer us a bright and rose-colored future, and chaffing at his casual and subtle hagiography with the phrase "innovation trends"---the tired denouement that technology will, once again, save the day. Where have we heard that before? This is an example of a simple propaganda technique called "misdirection."

And my favorite, when he "accuses" me of treating the IPCC report as the "holy writ of the apocalypse." Of course, I said no such thing. The IPCC report went unmentioned in my comment. Constitutes two simple propaganda techniques used in conjunction---"hyperbole" and "transfer."

It's rather obvious that climate scientists don't study "innovation trends." Propagandists like galt present themselves as "experts" on such vague and undefinable concepts such as "innovation trends" to downplay the true nature and meaning of climate change, and especially to dismiss the science of climate change and the climate scientists themselves.

It's ideologically based, and generally put forth in the service of corporate clients by front groups, often operating as scholarly sounding "think-tanks" or hiding behind ersatz "foundations." And of course the unmentioned and surely lucrative renumeration involved. But they'll have you believe that it's the entire scientific apparatus that's "ideologically" based by discrediting the science through a multitude of verbal pyrotechnics and shrewdly drafted missives that sound "sweet" but that are "sour" to the core, not to mention dishonest and...nothing more than manufactured propaganda.

They label these scientifically sound positions as "alarmist," and then attempt to bamboozle the untutored by hawking smooth sounding explanations and assertions that are as flat as the earth. Examine the very phrase "innovation trends." It's contrived and meaningless. What exactly is an "innovation trend?" The word "innovation" itself is descriptively vague, insofar that there surely exist as many definitions of what constitutes "innovation" as there are innovations. And "trend" is sufficiently vague as well, and certainly opaque when one is speaking of a "timeline."

From the invention of the wheel to the manufacturing of the Model T represents an "innovation trend." And in fact, Galt's claim that all these wonderful technologies, by virtue of merely "existing," will solve the climate crisis, constitute a series of "unstated assumptions," another technique of propaganda.

Beware of the Galts of the world in this day and age. Their bad faith and greasy words can do a lot of damage and cause a lot of harm.

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Do you practice in front of a mirror to sound so dumb? If you don't know what I mean by a phrase, you could simply ask to have it explained. The innovation trends I referred to are simple enough even YOU can understand them:

For the past 60 years, the cost of solar panels and batteries for the same lifetime capacity have declined exponentially.

Now, that last word is a big one so I'll 'splain it to you. It means the price drops by half every x years - just like Moore's law says the number of transistors doubles every 18 months. For solar panels, it's been about every 3.5 years. For batteries, about every 6.5 years.

What does all of that mean? It means that unless that trend STOPS for some reason (they do eventually, usually when they hit the limits of physics or the cost of raw materials and labor as absolute limits) then in about 5 years solar plus batteries will win everywhere with reasonable amounts of year round sun. And, for the record, NO legitimate scientist anywhere in the world is saying that solar and batteries are about to stop improving.

So, that simple explanation (which you could simply have asked for, if you weren't a political hack and climate alarmist cult member), renders the rest of your noisome rant as, well, just another noisome rant. Dolt.

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In your posts you're using m-dashes when commas are called for. Who's paying you is the only interesting question raised by your posts.

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I spread the good news that the much ballyhoo'd Apocalypse has been cancelled as a public service. The culties all agonize over the loss of their core faith.

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Hey Galt! Any suggestions on how to run an "exponential cost-analysis differential timeline" on a Neolithic wheel and a Model-T? Not a lot of accepted scholarly work available on neolithic transportation, but I'd hazard a guess and I hope you would too, that the neolithic model was the three-decker yacht of its day. Then again it might have had, in its day, all the fungibility of an abandoned Glad-bag of antimony in Professor Sadoway's basement lab. But all things being equal (and lordy they never are), Godspeed to the good professor and his endeavors nevertheless.

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I think you must be off your meds. Bless your heart.

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Lots of people on speed out there

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3-4% of it. We only contribute 3-4% of CO2. CO2 does not determine climate however. Location on the planet relative to the sun does. (Latitude, altitude, nearby large bodies of water, prevailing winds, etc. )

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I accept as 100% settled science the IPCC Report on Climate Change. That's why I know there is no "climate crisis."

What is in that report, and does it tell us we are doomed? The only scientific finding in the report is a stated belief that, "all other things remaining the same" (they never do), there is a relatively weak linear relationship between total atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature. If you then read through all of the scenarios provided, you see that the answer to whether we are doomed does not lie with climate science, but rather with whether and for how long we will continue to use fossil fuels.

That answer can only come from studying our innovation trends, which I did. For 70 years, the prices of solar panels and batteries (cost for a given performance over the lifetime of the item) have been on an almost perfect exponential decline, similar to many (most?) other technologies. Unlike mature technologies like the internal combustion engine, neither is yet approaching the theoretical limits of science, and so we can reasonably expect the trends to continue for at least another 20 years - which is far longer than the remaining 5 years before batteries plus solar will be capable of providing reliable power 24x7x365 WITHOUT fossil fuel backup and without subsidies in the most populous parts of the world. 6 years later, they will be half that cost - and utilities will be building solar and grid storage as fast as banks will lend and factories can build in order to get rid of their less profitable fossil fuel plants.

In short, by 2050 only a few hobbyists will still be using fossil fuels for energy, for the same reasons we stopped buying horses and typewriters. The earth will be about 1C cooler (exactly where it was at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution) due to the Grand Solar Minimum which started this year, and the "extra CO2" in our atmosphere will be getting re-sequestered for free thanks to the ONLY part of AGW science for which satellite observations have actually matched predictions - Global Greening.

So, if you BELIEVE THE SCIENCE there is no climate crisis.

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"....The only scientific finding in the report is a stated belief that, "all other things remaining the same" (they never do), there is a relatively weak linear relationship between total atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature. If you then read through all of the scenarios provided, you see that the answer to whether we are doomed does not lie with climate science, but rather with whether and for how long we will continue to use fossil fuels...."

Let's parse this paragraph of double speak from our earnest if not very amateur climate propagandist, Mr. Johnathan Galt, a true Randian devotee---shall we? Galt makes the false and dishonest (or ignorant, if you prefer) claim that "there is a relatively weak linear relationship between total atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature." This is nonsense of the highest order, and cheap propaganda of the lowest order. Climate scientists and their..."Observations throughout the world make it clear that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver." (2009)

Then Galt awkwardly and of course laughingly, and not too delicately---to all those who possess reading comprehension skills beyond, say, the fifth grade---pirouettes to the false premise that "the answer to whether we are doomed does not lie with climate science, but rather with whether and for how long we will continue to use fossil fuels." Fantastic! But of course this is a false premise! The premise is (most unskillfully and disingenuously) constructed from the statement that "whether we are doomed does not lie with climate science," but from the equally dubious and charlatanesque and fuzzy claim that all we have to do is stop burning fossil fuels! Easier said than done, wouldn't you say? Seeing as how our modern civilization is built on "burning fossil fuels?"

The key finding of climate science from the previous 40 years is that greenhouse gases (Co2 and a host of others) we've collectively thrown into the atmosphere since the advent of the industrial revolution, is that THIS is overwhelmingly the MAIN DRIVER OF CLIMATE CHANGE. Galt, here, is saying that climate scientists' study of greenhouse gases and how these gases interact with the atmosphere, and how they affect the climate, is just climate science! No shit, Mr. Galt! But it's merely climate science, nothing to trouble yourself over and good lord it's certainly not the chief driver of climate change, burning fossil fuels is the chief driver of climate change, not climate science...but, hey...isn't burning fossil fuels putting greenhouse gases back into....fuhgedaboutit.

But again, don't take my word for it, and certainly don't follow Galt's line of reasoning. It's not only poorly assembled propaganda, the clumsy syntax is headache-inducing.

Some links provide below.

https://climate.nasa.gov/faq/34/what-kinds-of-data-do-scientists-use-to-study-climate/

https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/

https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/#TS

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You realize that nothing you just said refuted a single thing I said?

The IPCC report concludes that there is a loose, roughly linear relationship between total atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature, providing no other factors intervene such as changing solar output.

That is a factual representation of the report, and if you argue against it then you are arguing against the science.

It means, furthermore, that when we stop using fossil fuels (about 20 years), temperatures will stop increasing. As a bonus, Global Greening means that the extra CO2 will be getting sucked up for free.

It's gotta suck when the core belief of your cult (that global warming will cause an Apocalypse) gets cut off at the knees. I'm sure you'll find a new religion.

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The small amount of temp and CO2 change is not a problem. There is no evidence that it's a problem or that it will become one.

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founding

I can never find anyone who’s expositions are as incisive AND gracious as Leighton’s. What a gift.

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"Follow the science" makes a good bumper sticker, but doesn't necessarily translate to good public policy, if for no other reason that 'science' rarely speaks with one voice.

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Not to mention that if you look at only one corner of science it may paint a dark and desperate picture - but when you put that same science in context with everything else that is going on, the future looks bright.

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What Mr. Daniels says above. It's rather easy to "follow the "science," but a citizen can get lost even looking for public policy." The corporations have won. None of this will "translate to good public policy" because there will be no public policy. There has never been meaningful public policy that seriously addresses climate change. Rather than studying---and then extrapolating from---current "innovation trends," best to study recent political and cultural "trends," from from nation states to the international farce and political theater that is The Paris Accords. "Public policy" was sold, purchased and privatized years ago.

And what Galt fails to mention, conveniently, is the amount of time the build-out of all these fabulous, unproven technologies will consume. That's EVEN if these magical technologies amount to anything other than some MIT professor's expensive basement extra-curricular hobby.

Here's a more realistic timeline of innovation trends: 1870: Rockefeller founds Standard Oil; 1913: Henry Ford begins manufacturing automobiles on his first assembly line; 1956: President Eisenhower signs the Federal-Aid Highway Act, creating the Interstate Highway System. That's a timeline of 86 years---JUST to get today's chief mode of transportation AND THE ONE WE ARE HIGHLY DEPENDANT ON, at the near total exclusion of all others, off the ground!

"There is a relatively weak linear relationship between total atmospheric CO2 and global average temperature...." or so says Ayn Rand's own creation, Mr. Johnny Galt. Which is unmitigated bullshit, or sloppy propaganda, if you prefer.

I wouldn't take this corporate stooge's evaluation and interpretation of the IPCC report. And don't take mine either---which, I assure you, is markedly different from Galt's. Read it yourself and generate your own analysis and form your own opinion.

https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/

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Why are you feebly trying to "interpret" what other people said? You can't even get your OWN words straight.

"... or so says Ayn Rand's own creation, Mr. Johnny Galt..."

Oh ho - there it is! And another basement dwelling bed wetting pimple faced collectivist is triggered by the mere name of a 70 year old fictional character representing those two most terrifying attributes in all the universe - reason and personal responsibility. It never gets old!

Frankly lady, you're a kook and I don't give a hoot whether you believe me. In fact I'm sure you won't - clearly you are a card carrying member of the cult of climate Armageddon. Now go troll someone else - I'm not here to hold your hand.

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Many apologies. Unaware that your Excel-generated spreadsheets also served as PSA's. Don't I feel foolish---what one expects from a doomsday kook like me, though. But with the fast-approaching crackling flames and the unrelenting warming drafts emanating from Dante's 7th-level of hell, and the great apocalypse fast approaching, I've been too busy on the streets, attired in the complementary "doomsday sandwich-board." But only as a "public service." A "public service" all my own. You know, broadcasting to the general populace to repent---repent and confess your sins now! Confess to your poor recycling habits, all those hamburgers and porterhouse steaks consumed, the series of SUVs purchased and driven....and don't get me started on those 15-minute showers....I suppose we're end-of-times competitors with our messaging.

Though I still can't be sure you're not auditioning to be Bill Gates' new Executive Assistant, now that Melinda is off and running. The tells are there: conspicuous use and advertising of Microsoft Office programs, a nice little soundbite (PSA?) for Ambri, a company whose majority stockholder is...former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates! One more thing. Maybe you can help me out here. Let's shift gears in our relationship for a moment. I'm extensively involved in the nation's ag sector so I'm more than aware of Gates' recent fondness for large swaths of American real estate, more than 300,000 acres acquired thus far---and counting. Most of it is previously planted farmland in solar-heavy regions.

Now, work with me here. Sadoway's lemonade/antimony filled batteries, in order to be commercially viable are going to require a shit-load of land to build out---correct? So I'm wondering---might some of that real estate be earmarked for the giant solar farms necessary for non-fossil fuel sources to provide baseload energy? Room for panels and batteries all? An interesting hypothesis. In all honesty, this is a project I'm rooting for. Most of the real estate is somewhat marginal for crop production, so....godspeed to Professor Sadoway and Mr. Gates and their antinomy batteries! Keep churnin' out the spreadsheets. And I promise not to be so doomsdayish in the future. Although I think we might eventually both be candidates to be frog-marched, in the first wave of the Great Intellectual Pogrom to the Brooks Range gulag now under construction. Mazel tov!

Addendum: my acne began to clear when I moved from Granny's basement to the attic. Bit more air circulation helped immensely. In fact, the complexion has cleared to the point where Becky Lynn has agreed to hangout with me at the malt shop. Oh joy! Hate to finish by scolding, but Ayn Rand. My dismissal of her was literature-based. Could care less about an author's political views or moral composition. Advice take a break from the spreadsheets and read some real literature. Ayn Rand, after all, is the kook's kook.

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You should NOT care about MY spreadsheet. Nobody should - that's why I explained how to DERIVE it. You should re-create the exercise yourself. Only idiots take anyone else at face value on the internet without verifying. But, your apologies are accepted. And, as a leftist I'm confident you are too lazy to ever undertake the exercise - especially knowing in advance that it completely punctures your feeble doomsday arguments.

On the other hand, maybe you're right and it's ALREADY too late. In that case, bend over and kiss your butt goodbye - because there is NOTHING governments can do at this point to change the timeline of the change. Somehow, I think it will be ok. We are 40,000 years into THIS inter glacial period, still well within the temperature variability for THIS inter glacial and a whopping 8C less than the LAST inter glacial 130,000 years ago. Say, someone must have been burning an AWFUL lot of fossil fuels back then! Atlanteans? https://geology.utah.gov/map-pub/survey-notes/glad-you-asked/ice-ages-what-are-they-and-what-causes-them/

Regarding Gates: He's a billionaire, and whether or not he's "evil" or "good" he is a smart one. He invests in LOTS of things. You sound like one of those babbling anti-Trump kooks always screaming that because Trump tried to do a deal in Russia once he must have been involved in "Russian Collusion!" Here's the simple truth: Billionaires are smart, and invest their money where they think it will make lots MORE money. They do it all over the world because that's where the best ideas come from.

I agree Rand was a terrible writer of fiction. Anyone honest does. I've even been to Rand gatherings, and they say the same thing. Her writing is cartoonish - probably to try to get her point across to the less gifted. Despite her pedantic oversimplification, some still don't get it. Most of those are leftists. It is notable, then, that despite that shortcoming she is one of the more widely read authors in history. Perhaps you missed something in there. In any case, I chose the name for the immense level of Schadenfreude it brings me, automatically causing crazy collectivists to experience seizures, then spout leftist talking points as if they were prayers to ward off good (they ARE evil, after all). They almost always follow the same pattern - first scorning Rand, then striving to convince me that she "broke her ideals" because she (gasp!) accepted Social Security and Medicare. Then they usually run away when I point out that Rand paid far more into those programs (albeit involuntarily) than she ever received, and thus it was a benefit paid for in full, not welfare.

I met her once at one of her last public appearances. Still whip smart, prophetic (she spoke of global balkanization, and the coming breakup of the Soviet Union), but a bitter old woman. It's good to HAVE ideals, it isn't healthy to worship ideals obsessively, and it's even less healthy to allow a lover you gained by cheating on another lover to gain control of your assets. As is so often the case, the author's own choice of "the hero" was wrong in Atlas Shrugged - the real hero was Francisco D'Anconia, a man who accepted the fact of ideals but did not so obsessively follow them as to become an unbalanced machine.

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Some friendly advice? Try downshifting every so often...it's good for the soul...sound for the spirit. In a very real sense, nobody really gives a shit about all this left/right nonsense. I certainly don't and neither should you.

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I mean, if you read a lot of what gets published these days in peer-reviewed scientific journals, you can understand why they'd rather you just blindly take their word for it. LOL Take this shameless insanity for example: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34039063/

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It's what happens when science becomes politicized and democratized.

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Ask Galileo how that went for him...

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I was taught at a young age to question everything, and it was okay to do so. Today if you question something or someone, it's considered that you don't believe in science or their political views, or your racist, or any other thing without the answer. There is something deeply wrong in this society today because of the lack of questioning and getting answers

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"Test everything. Retain what is good." (1 Thessalonians 5:21)

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Democrats are a zealous cult mob. They believe in only one thing - power - and are fanatically devoted to obtaining it by any means.

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....While the republicans have been busy all these years organizing and hosting bake sales for disadvantaged children...

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At least one of us does something useful.

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Republican "asset?" A political party not fanatically devoted to obtaining power by any means is a political party not destined to last. Any more Hallmark political "greetings" in your outbox?

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Spoken like a true totalitarian wannabe! But, no, the vast majority - presented with what minorities like you represent - will quickly reject you unless thoroughly fooled by your propaganda.

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I'll meet you half-way: my propaganda is not nearly as thoroughly presented or calculatingly polished as your propaganda. You're earning your keep with your paymasters, whatever front group or ersatz "foundation" they represent.

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Oh- and fyi there is no "half way" with propagandists like you. It's all idiotology.

I can prove each and every thing I say, you cannot. Period.

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I write as a public service, a counterpoint to doomsday kooks like you. I don't bother with either party's silly propaganda, I deal in facts ANYONE can find for themselves.

ANYONE can re-create the research I've done with Google and an Excel spreadsheet. It will take a full day, so it isn't for lazy lefties, but anyone who SERIOUSLY wants to know what is happening can chart it out.

Look up, by year, the various solar technologies available and figure out the lifetime price per kWh the product will generate. Chart all available technologies in that year you can find - some disappear because of fraudulent claims after a year or two - so go back and remove them. Pick the "best performance per dollar" product for each year when you are done, and chart the series on a log graph. It will be almost a perfect straight line for over 60 years, with cost per kWh dropping by half about every 3.5 years.

Repeat the same exercise for batteries, calculating the total price per kWh expected to be charged and released over the effective lifetime of the battery in question as well as efficiency. The technology changes more - starting with lead acid lasting no more than a few hundred cycles, moving through Nickel Cadmium to Nickel Metal Hydride to various forms of Lithium Ion. Again plot it, and you will find the price drops by half about every 6.5-7 years.

Finally, look at Lazard's charts for LCOE. Projecting the charts you just created just a few years, figure out when the sum of the cost per kWh for solar plus the cost to charge and release that power later is less than the cost of power from natural gas plants. there's a bit more work there because you have to adjust for installation costs, inverters, chargers, etc. but a lot of that can be pulled from charts on the internet that break out solar and storage total costs.

My results can be repeated by anyone. Aunt Martha can't even make a consistent batch of iced tea with her silly propaganda.

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To paraphrase two time Noble Prize winner (medicine) Hans Selye (from his book In Vitro): "There are two kinds of scientists: problem finders and problem solvers. One problem finder can keep dozens of problem solvers busy for decades."

When a problem finder appears suddenly on the scene, s/he is often reviled for being totally ignorant of "what we know." Why?

Because this "finder" raises questions about "what everybody knows." This is often done by questioning a fundamental assumption underlying the work of the "solvers." The finders soon realize that if their bedrock assumption is invalid, so might their years of research be wrong and their future bleak.

Think global warming: current dogma holds that human-produced CO2 is the main driver of GW. In spite of the failure of models to accurately predict temperature increases over the past 30 - 40 years (think of the models as an hypothesis to be tested against empiracle observations, not as scientific data), the dogma is so strongly believed that it's practically impossible to challenge.

What this means is that studies that focus on CO2 increases to explain the warming trend are far more likely to get funded by government agencies than natural causes of GW (such as the influence of the sun) because such government funding is dependent on peer review . . . . and peer reviewers are mainly "solvers."

Or so I'd argue.

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This is nonsense. When did anyone named Hans Selye win a Nobel Prize? Never mind two. No one not even Landsteiner has received two Nobel prizes in medicine. Selye did not receive a Nobel prize in any field

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As Reads: "The finders soon realize . . . future bleak."

Should Read: "The solvers soon realize . . . future bleak."

Sorry.

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One of the interesting things about Albert Einstein was that the German empiricists wanted to flay him alive. This phenomenon I call "Value Meme Conflict" and occurs when two different social groups or individuals possess a large enough differential in complexity of thinking that they view the other as incomprehensible or worse. This is a big part of what is going on with the Pro-Fauci and Anti-Fauci scientists -- one group are authority-driven and belief-based, the other are far more rich and complex thinkers. But because we've been raised with the myth of "science is science" we simply don't have the mental models to understand the conflict, or its virulence. Here's a start: https://empathy.guru/2020/10/07/the-memetic-wars-have-truly-begun-empathy-in-the-time-of-coronavirus/

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Today if you even mention empirical evidence as a counter to "peer reviewed theory," you are immediately branded a heretic. Never mind that real world data shows your model is wrong, you are simply a denier.

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These is no "faith" in science. We take on faith what cannot be proven.

Science is based on what can be proven.

If you want to guess, use faith.

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Nope. Science does not "prove" - it TESTS propositions.

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The original meaning of the word "prove" is "to test". That's why we take planes to "Proving Grounds" to test their performance.

Looking at word origins often clarifies discussions.

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If there is no faith in science, then you do not believe anything anyone else tells you, you perform every experiment yourself in order to verify the facts.

If you accept the testimony of someone else about the conditions and/or results of an experiment, then you are operating, at least in part, on faith.

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You're using the term faith and belief inappropriately in an attempt to deceive the unwary. Scientists must, first and foremost, abandon faith and belief.

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Does a scientist personally perform every experiment in his field, refusing to accept the results of any experiment he has not personally performed and witnessed? Obviously not.

So, to the extent that any scientist relies on the witness of another scientist about the latter's experiments and his results, then the first scientist is relying on his faith in, and trust of, the second scientist's ability to objectively witness.

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That's neither "faith" not "trust." You're a deceiver - or, probably, just stupid.

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Again, Hominid, show some respect for the idea that you profess. Provide evidence demonstrating how I am wrong.

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Please stop the abuse of others.

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Thanks for the reply. Actually, it is the opposite, with everybody who can do so trying to duplicate it and check their results. Ain't no faith in hard-nosed science. Numbers rule.

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Well, what you describe is the THEORY of how it works, but in practice, there is very little duplication. Journals simply won't publish results of attempts to reproduce original experiments, so most "publish-or-perish" scientists cannot afford to attempt to reproduce anything.

Your statement "Numbers rule" is exactly correct. That's how experimental science works. For formal science, that isn't true, but it certainly is for experimental science. We just have to remember that those numbers are often not generated by the scientists themselves, but are generated by one, or a handful, of scientists and the rest of the scientists begin their work by trusting the witness of the original experimenters.

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Nope. For every assertion, there will be many checks and arguments, trying to prove something or other.

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For formal science, like math, the numbers aren't as important as the adherence to the rules of logic. In formal science, axioms rule.

For applied science, numbers are very important, but the real proof in the pudding is, did this application of principle actually resolve the problem being addressed? That's often a subjective judgement call.

So, numbers rule for experimental science, but not necessarily for the other two branches of knowledge (formal and applied).

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Please stop this attempt to salvage the idea. The year I did research for the US government agencies, NRC, NASA, and DCPA, we depended exactly on numbers, backed up by precise, just-calibrated equipment of all kinds. We were researching how to mitigate particular problems with safety relief systems in Mark I & II BWR's and other very technical investigations.

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Boy, did you miss the entire point or what?

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statistics

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Real numbers.

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Binary tree?

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I started out in analog.

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I worked on the Turing machine

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Really? I am 77, and we had already gotten past those old ones which came with spare flints. We had ferrite cores.

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Everyone talks about this RACE problem and says that this RACE problem will be over when the third-world pours into EVERY White country and ONLY into WHITE countries.

Everyone says the final solution to this RACE problem is for EVERY White country and ONLY White countries to “assimilate,” that is, intermarry, with all those non-Whites.

They’re pushing White Genocide!

They claim they are “anti-racist”, what they are is anti-White.

Anti-racist is a code word for anti-White.

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In spite of the "man made climate change aka global warming" Mars and Venus are heating up at the same rate as Mother Earth. In fact, some leftist asshole duly noted that "climate change" was the reason we can';t colonize Venus. Huh. I wonder how many SUVs and Petrochemical Facilities were there to make the planet unlivable.

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“This is not science; it’s politics”

“ad-hoc ethical rationalization”

Very succinct and very on-point

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The people we really need to trust are the engineers. They are asked to take the most settled science such as Newtonin physics and produce results that are practical, affordable and safe. When we talk about adversely mixing science and politics that is something that is hard NOT to do when less than 2% of the 535 members in the US congress have science background and zero have any engineering background. Compare this to the party leadership in China - where 95% of the members have science and engineering degrees (mostly from the best US colleges). This is why China makes everything. We (the West) actually trust China's engineers to design and run the factories that make the products that Amazon and Walmart deliver.

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Pinterest belongs to this "religion". They removed my account permanently because I was posting science that opposed the official narrative. Not medical advice, mind you - science - scientific papers; videos with doctors advocating for early outpatient treatment (with a drug they love to hate that is on the NIH list for treating COVID). I call them "Pinterest Pravda" now. They told me (after the fact) that I was posting "misinformation" and that only CDC and WHO qualified as legitimate information sources. The thing is that government is precisely the wrong place to look for information because they have their own *DISinformation* campaign going. I look to those who are willing to discuss things the government wants us to ignore - such as the amount of adverse events that there have been and the fact that they have stopped other vaccines at deaths as low as 25. With these vaccines, there have been thousands. Like Facebook Pravda, they allow truly insane posts about everything, including science, but if you dare disagree with the official narrative, they'll take you down. You're not allowed to discuss truly scientific articles that have a different viewpoint. And science demands that there be vigorous discussion. It's not science if you can't discuss it. It's a religion; it's dogma.

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Wow. It’s Plato’s Cavern today. More than ever.

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