Ian Rawlings wrote:

On 2007-03-19, Stephen Firth wrote:

Which could be condensed to "Eat ****! A million flies can't be wrong."

While your approach can be condensed to "believe the cranks, they have
to be right *sometimes*".

Umm no, it's my view that the evidence should be evaluated and that root
causes should be demonstrated, not assumed. Also that evidence that
counters a hypothesis should not be ignored simply because it is
convenient to do so.

I dont understand why relatively intelligent people imagine that
science is based on a majority vote.

It's not, but when the majority in a growing field are finding the
same thing, pinning your hopes to the minority tends to make you look
a tad desperate.

I have no doubt that the earth has warmed. You seem to be trying to
paint me into a corner that I have not stood in.

Note that the majority of scientists in the field are not responsible

You could have stopped there.

for the daft hysteria behind the more outlandish bunny-hugging, the
scientific consensus is quite modest, something like a few degrees
change over a couple of hundred years. *that* is the consensus, the
rest is just media panic-mongering and opportunist politics.

Indeed, and any suggestion that global warming has been proved to be
man-made is also without real foundation. Remember there's a closer
inverse correlation between the numbers of pirates and global warming
than there is between industrial activity and global warming.

And in order to believe in man-made global warming one has to ignore the
warming of other planets in the solar system.

One also wonders why we have frequent claims that the rate of climate
change is faster than it has ever been when this statement is a flat
lie.

On Mon, 19 Mar 2007 15:03:39 GMT, "Lurkio"
mused:

Stephen Firth wrote:

I think the "green" lobby are a bunch of ****ing liars.

I think we need to start writing and complaining to the papers and the Media
about this "Global warming" issue - OK it may be happening but look back and
you'll find vinyards in the UK in Roman Times (and I'm guessing they did
not have 4x4s)

I was thinking about this on the way home from work. It costs me
enough to keep a van on the road, and the odd car for non-work. I'm
not against paying for things I use, or paying towards things that may
benefit me, but paying more out just for the sake of paying more is a
bit too much. I can't do any less miles, jobs are at fixed locations,
I can't very easily get shopping centres and business parks Fed-Exed
to me so I can fit stuff to them, I have to drive to them.

But, if it benefits us, then it means we're not being robbed blind so
someone loses out, so I can't see anything happening.

30years ago we had global cooling panic in the papers - Its just a natural
cycle and anyway humans produce only a very small % of co2 emmissions
cows fart more greenhouse gasses, sheep were blamed for the hole in the
ozone layer a few years ago and now Its my fault because I have an old
fashioned lightbulb ?

--
Regards,
Stuart.

On 2007-03-19, Stephen Firth wrote:

Umm no, it's my view that the evidence should be evaluated and that root
causes should be demonstrated, not assumed. Also that evidence that
counters a hypothesis should not be ignored simply because it is
convenient to do so.

And you're capable of doing so?

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!

Ian Rawlings wrote:

On 2007-03-19, Stephen Firth wrote:

Umm no, it's my view that the evidence should be evaluated and that root
causes should be demonstrated, not assumed. Also that evidence that
counters a hypothesis should not be ignored simply because it is
convenient to do so.

And you're capable of doing so?

There are two statements above, to which do you refer?

On 2007-03-19, Stephen Firth wrote:

Ian Rawlings wrote:

On 2007-03-19, Stephen Firth wrote:

Umm no, it's my view that the evidence should be evaluated and that root
causes should be demonstrated, not assumed. Also that evidence that
counters a hypothesis should not be ignored simply because it is
convenient to do so.

And you're capable of doing so?

There are two statements above, to which do you refer?

Yep sorry ;-)

It was the evaluation of the evidence.

What I see is people dismissing the viewpoint of experts in the field
who are actually at the coal face, but the people doing the dismissing
aren't experts in any of the relevant fields. I know that I can't mix
it with physicists, geologists, chemists, zoologists and so on as the
disciplines are so refined that no-one can be an expert in them all.

What people seem to be doing is to listen to evidence and pick the
stuff that seems to fit what they want, and then cling to it. That
daft channel 4 documentary that people are lining up behind is a good
example, some were hailing it as the "most important contribution to
the climate debate" in ages. In reality much of the evidence was
heavily twisted, according to people who were presented on the
programme as *supporters* of the programme's point of view. Some of
it was proven wrong and withdrawn a long time ago by some other
"supporters" featured on the programme, and the rest was dubious at
best.

However people lined up behind it as it supported their view that the
whole climate change thing was stuff and nonsense. But they've never
seen any of the proper arguments put forward by those who are actually
at the coal face. An example is the relative mix of carbon isotopes
in the atmosphere, a short extract from a paper on this was somewhat
mind-numbing to a non-physicist like myself, and how can I be expected
to evaluate such evidence. And if I was a physicist, how can I
evaluate evidence put forward by a geologist.

It's this impenetrable, complex work that is defining the current
understanding of the situation re climate change, and the current
consensus is that we're not helping at all as a species. You or I
can't sit here and say that we don't believe any of it unless we're
prepared to say that it's a matter of faith, and I for one do not like
matters of faith.

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!

Ian Rawlings wrote:

You or I can't sit here and say that we don't believe any of it unless
we're prepared to say that it's a matter of faith

You may not be able to, but since I've been a scientist for many years,
with an interest in Geology which formed part of my degree as well as
Biochemistry which was the major subject of my degree and with a long
track record in scientific trials and evaluations I'm qualified to
evaluate scientific evidence.

It's a mistake to think that one has to be one of the "in crowd" in
order to evaluate the work in a particular field. Richard Feynman, one
of the few Nobel prizewinners I have ever met was a Physicist, yet NASA
called him in to evaluate the causes of the first shuttle disaster and
he did a first rate job. Not because he was an expert in rocket
engineering but because he knew how to ask difficult questions.

Man made global warming is not the done deal that you seem to think it
is. Also you have the concept of scientific proof completely arse about
face. One does not accept the hypothesis made by a group of scientists
until one can prove that it is false. The null hypothesis is that there
is no effect and it is up to those supporting the hypothesis to
demonstrate an effect. To date those proposing that global warming is
man made have shown an association with human activity, but associations
at the same or similar levels of confidence can be shown with other
variable which are unlikely to be causes of global warming. Therefore
the case remains unproved.

You say you don't like matters of faith, but belief in man made global
warming remains just that, a declaration of faith.

On 2007-03-20, Stephen Firth wrote:

You may not be able to, but since I've been a scientist for many years,
with an interest in Geology which formed part of my degree as well as
Biochemistry which was the major subject of my degree and with a long
track record in scientific trials and evaluations I'm qualified to
evaluate scientific evidence.

Somehow I just knew that you'd reckon you were up to the job...

You're not. You might think you are but you can't claim that you can
hold your own against the thousands of people who have actually been
involved directly with the research, across many different
disciplines, no one person can.

It's a mistake to think that one has to be one of the "in crowd" in
order to evaluate the work in a particular field.

So you can tell if there's bias in any particular measuring or
collecting technique, and are immersed in each discipline enough to
know if a given technique has an inherent bias or is no longer
considered accurate enough? Across all the disciplines involved? I
don't reckon so.

Richard Feynman, one of the few Nobel prizewinners I have ever met
was a Physicist, yet NASA called him in to evaluate the causes of
the first shuttle disaster and he did a first rate job. Not because
he was an expert in rocket engineering but because he knew how to
ask difficult questions.

So he was asked to do a job and did it? Great. Not really relevant
in this case though, because we're talking about thousands of people
doing their different jobs to come to a rough consensus, versus you!

Man made global warming is not the done deal that you seem to think
it is.

I might seem to think it's a done deal to you, but I don't, it's a
rough consensus at the moment, and the atmospheric modelling isn't
accurate yet, no-one claims it is but it's prudent to use what we have
if it's pointing somewhere we don't want to go. The probability is
with the relatively mild predictions, the more bonkers predictions
seem to be about as probable as the "nothing will happen" predictions.

Also you have the concept of scientific proof completely arse about
face. One does not accept the hypothesis made by a group of
scientists until one can prove that it is false.

Waiting for undisputed proof (if there is such a thing) is too slow
however, it's not totally proven yet but it's looking bloody likely,
and therefore it's prudent to act now. It's not prudent to go to the
excesses of some of the greenies of course. It's certainly not
prudent to dismiss the whole thing out of hand and say "I know all the
scientists working on this are wrong", as you see in newsgroups day
after day.

It's also prudent to try and stop pouring so much carbon into the
atmosphere when we're at the stage of realising it's likely to have an
effect, but we're not 100% sure what that will be.

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!

On Tue, 20 Mar 2007 07:44:05 +0000, Ian Rawlings
wrote:

On 2007-03-20, Stephen Firth wrote:

You may not be able to, but since I've been a scientist for many years,
with an interest in Geology which formed part of my degree as well as
Biochemistry which was the major subject of my degree and with a long
track record in scientific trials and evaluations I'm qualified to
evaluate scientific evidence.

Somehow I just knew that you'd reckon you were up to the job...

You're not. You might think you are but you can't claim that you can
hold your own against the thousands of people who have actually been
involved directly with the research, across many different
disciplines, no one person can.

It's a mistake to think that one has to be one of the "in crowd" in
order to evaluate the work in a particular field.

So you can tell if there's bias in any particular measuring or
collecting technique, and are immersed in each discipline enough to
know if a given technique has an inherent bias or is no longer
considered accurate enough? Across all the disciplines involved? I
don't reckon so.

Richard Feynman, one of the few Nobel prizewinners I have ever met
was a Physicist, yet NASA called him in to evaluate the causes of
the first shuttle disaster and he did a first rate job. Not because
he was an expert in rocket engineering but because he knew how to
ask difficult questions.

So he was asked to do a job and did it? Great. Not really relevant
in this case though, because we're talking about thousands of people
doing their different jobs to come to a rough consensus, versus you!

Man made global warming is not the done deal that you seem to think
it is.

I might seem to think it's a done deal to you, but I don't, it's a
rough consensus at the moment, and the atmospheric modelling isn't
accurate yet, no-one claims it is but it's prudent to use what we have
if it's pointing somewhere we don't want to go. The probability is
with the relatively mild predictions, the more bonkers predictions
seem to be about as probable as the "nothing will happen" predictions.

Also you have the concept of scientific proof completely arse about
face. One does not accept the hypothesis made by a group of
scientists until one can prove that it is false.

Waiting for undisputed proof (if there is such a thing) is too slow
however, it's not totally proven yet but it's looking bloody likely,
and therefore it's prudent to act now. It's not prudent to go to the
excesses of some of the greenies of course. It's certainly not
prudent to dismiss the whole thing out of hand and say "I know all the
scientists working on this are wrong", as you see in newsgroups day
after day.

It's also prudent to try and stop pouring so much carbon into the
atmosphere when we're at the stage of realising it's likely to have an
effect, but we're not 100% sure what that will be.

Whether there is Global warming or not there is one thing that is
patently clear. The drive attacking "gas guzzlers" and Edison light
bulbs etc is just window dressing.

The simple reality is that the elements under attack are a drop in the
ocean compared to the vast resources consumed (and therefore effluent
produced) by every industry that operates a designed obsolecence
policy, or which operates as a consequence of fashion.

Every day we dispose of millions of perfectly useful items simply
because they are no longer fashionable. Go to you local amenity tip
and sit and watch perfectly good puschairs, bicycles, and other
household goods being dumped.

Go to you local scrapyard and look at the quality of th vehicles that
are being scrapped today - some scrapyards look exactly like
second-hand showrooms with vehicles with perfectly good bodies being
scrapped becaue their engines fail to meet emissions regulations -
what a waste of resources.

My Austin Champ may only do about 10mpg and wouldn't meet modern
emissions requirements but, its carbon cost across its lifetime will
be far less than anything built and run today.

Ewan Scott

Ian Rawlings wrote:

Not really relevant in this case though, because we're talking about
thousands of people doing their different jobs to come to a rough
consensus, versus you!

I tell you what, go away and come back when you know how science works.

On 2007-03-20, Ewan Scott wrote:

Go to you local scrapyard and look at the quality of th vehicles
that are being scrapped today - some scrapyards look exactly like
second-hand showrooms with vehicles with perfectly good bodies being
scrapped becaue their engines fail to meet emissions regulations -
what a waste of resources.

Hybrid cars appear to be far worse than even current modern cars, due
to their extremely expensive manufacturing costs. The best approach
is to keep the car you've got, but I doubt that's going to go down
well!!

My Austin Champ may only do about 10mpg and wouldn't meet modern
emissions requirements but, its carbon cost across its lifetime will
be far less than anything built and run today.

I've got a 1973 Steyr-Puch Pinzgauer 712M 6x6, it does 13 MPG but in
its 33 years of life it's done less than 27,000 miles. I wouldn't
suggest using it as an everyday car, it's a bitch to park, but there's
a fair few euroboxes that have done worse harm than that. Ditto my
old Defender and my audi diesel, the audi does 47MPG measured, the
current crop of hybrids aren't supposed to be much better in real
world figures. Adding 10-15MPG to the figures of an old audi doesn't
justify the expense of buying a new car, and one that's supposed to be
extremely costly to make.

--
Blast off and strike the evil Bydo empire!