The unbearable desperation of ignorance

BPSDBRick Hodgin of the MIT Methane fraud is at it again, this time with “Possible natural explanation found for West Antarctica’s warming.”

What he is trying to pull this time is to blame the recently documented warming of the Antarctic on a volcano eruption similar to one discovered to have occurred 2,300 years ago.

It stands to reason that if there is an active volcano in Antarctica, one capable of punching a hole through the ice sheet and spewing “a layer of volcanic ash and glass shards” over 23,000 km² at some point, then it (and its nearby possibly as-of-yet-unidentified brothers) may well be the cause of a one degree Fahrenheit increase observable in the western section of Antarctica over the past 50 years.

It stands to reason? What kind of reasoning is that? I wonder what it is that he finds reasonable?

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Vox Populi: Blogs II

BPSDBAs threatened earlier it is time for Vox Populi again, more blog rating and classifying. The reasons for doing this are explained in Vox Populi I so I won’t belabour that.

What is new is the ‘new and improved’ is the Blogroll page, the place to keep all of these rated/sorted blogs. OK then, get voting, and remember:

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Understanding why climate change means global famine

BPSDBOne of the unfortunate things about Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” is it led to the notion that the principle threat posed by climate change is coastal flooding.

One could watch the film and conclude that if you didn’t live near a coast climate change is problem that need not concern you directly.   NOT!

A few days ago New Scientist published “Billions could go hungry from global warming by 2100 and this seemed to surprise a lot of people.   Apparently they had no idea. Reality check. Far and away the most serious threat posed by climate change is famine, truly massive, global famine.

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Explain, apologise, but never debate

BPSDB

• Climate Wars
• Icing Asher
• Never Debate

Climate Wars

The CBC ‘Ideas’ series is presenting Gwynne Dyer’s “Climate Wars.” Fortunately a friend alerted me to it at the last moment and I managed to catch Part 1, and based on that I am recommending it to all.

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Sherlock Holmes and case of the climate bandwagon

BPSDB

Holmes: Inspector Lestrade, I understand that you have arrested Mr Algore .

Lestrade: Indeed I have Holmes. Once again the Yard brings the miscreants to justice, thank you very much; and without your … ‘assistance’,  I might add.

Holmes: Quite so, quite so. May I enquire as to the nature of the evidence?

Lestrade: Your Baker Street methods will cut no cheese this time Holmes, that horse has left the stable. Besides, this is a simple fraud case, not your usual cup of tea, is it?

Holmes: Even so Lestrade, if you would indulge me?

Lestrade: Very well. It seems your Mr Algore has been defrauding the widows and orphans of London with some sort of lantern show which he calls ‘Discomforting Verities’ or some such nonsense.

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Blinded, but not by science

BPSDB

Ted Talks just recently posted a 2002 talk by Biochemist Kary Mullis: Celebrating the scientific experiment.

“Biochemist Kary Mullis talks about the basis of modern science: the experiment. Sharing tales from the 17th century and from his own backyard-rocketry days, Mullis celebrates the curiosity, inspiration and rigor of good science in all its forms.”

Unfortunately Mullis illustrates the truth of his excellent advice by completely ignoring it and instead spouts a bunch of utter nonsense about climate science.

Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes

We start with a 20 minute talk about the history of science and what makes for good science that is folksy, engaging and quite enjoyable.

As an anchor for the talk he uses the book Leviathan and the Air-Pump to emphasize the importance of verifiable evidence over received wisdom.

He then launches into a 10 minute anti-climate science polemic in which he ignores everything that he had just said. A predictable result is that what he concludes is utterly foolish.

There is nothing particularly interesting about being hopelessly wrong about climate change. Two minutes with a search engine shows that it is common enough.

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Closed Thread

Up to a point. Let’s try and keep it to climate science, more or less.

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Twits and ASS at the Daily Dreck

BPSDB I refer of course to Anti-Science Syndrome (ASS) as described at Climate Progress, and Michael Asher at Daily Tech has it bad.

Barely a week after Deltoid noted that the Arctic ice situation was so bad that no climate change Denier would be so stupid as to try and claim things were OK, Asher published “Sea Ice Ends Year at Same Level as 1979”

Now Asher’s piece is so transparently false that I didn’t consider it worth debunking, but just as Lambert underestimated the Denier’s guile, I underestimated their fans gullibility. Sure enough this thing has been popping up around the net as if it were believable.

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Ambler Huffs and Puffs, but really he just blows

BPSDBOn Saturday The Huffington Post inexplicably published a climate change Denier screed “Mr. Gore: Apology Accepted” by Harold Amber. The piece itself is a very juvenile collection of some of the standard Denier fables, easily exposed as false and of no great interest.

As such I will debunk it last and first ask the more interesting question, “why?”

Legitimate challenges to aspects of climate science appear in publications like New Scientist all of the time, as they should. There is no reason The Huffington Post should not do so as well. But make no mistake, this is not a “skeptical” article (as you will see).

Ambler’s piece is so lame it is worthy of NewsBlusters or The Examiner, particularly as it affects the same tone of self-righteous arrogance as only the truly ignorant can manage. It is pure Denierism unsullied by any stain of accuracy or logic.

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